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Zbc JBnaUeb 
Com^ble Ibumainc 


ADAM BEDE 


BY 

GEORGE ELIOT 


^be J6ngli0b Comebte Ibumaine 

Masterpieces of the great English novelists 
in which are portrayed the varying aspects 
of English life from the time of Addison 
to the present day : a series analogous to 
that in which Balzac depicted the manners 
and morals of his French contemporaries 

¥ 

fivst Series 

TWELVE VOLUMES 

LIST OF TITLES AND AUTHORS 


2 

3 

4 

5 

6 

7 

8 

9 

10 

1 1 
12 


Sir Roger de Coverley. | ’ff 

I achard Steele 

The Vicar of Wakefield. Oliver Goldsmith 


The Man of Feeling 
Pamela .... 
Joseph Andrews 
Humphry Clinker . 
Pride and Prejudice 
Guy Mannering 

CONINGSBY 

The Caxtons 
Jane Eyre 

It is Never too Lat 
Mend .... 
Adam Bede . 
Barchester Towers 


. He7iry Mackenzie 
. Samuel Richardson 
. Henry Fielding 
. Tobias Smollett 
. Jane A usten 
. Sir Walter Scott 
. Benjamin Disraeli 
. Bulwer Lytton 
. Charlotte Bronte 
l TO 

. Charles Reade 
. George Eliot 
. Anthony Trollope 



TIbe Bn0«6b Comcfble ‘fcumaine 


ADAM BEDE / 

%oi 

'HTss 


GEORGE ELIOT 



NEW YORK 

Zbc Ccntur? Co. 

1902 


THE LIBRARY OF 

congress. 

Two Co^'.es Received 

DEC. 3 , 1902 

» CoP^lOHT .ENTRY 

CLASS ^XXc. No. 
COPY A. 


Gopynght, 1902, by 

The Century Co. 


Published November, tgo2. 


ADAM BEDE. 


BOOK L 


CHAPTER I. 

THE WORKSHOP. 

W ITH a single drop of ink for a mirror, the Egyptian 
sorcerer undertakes to reveal to any chance comer 
far-reaching visions of the past. This is what I undertake 
to do for you, reader. With this drop of ink at the end of 
my pen, I will show you the roomy workshop of Mr. Jona- 
than Burge, carpenter and builder, in the village of Hay- 
slope, as it appeared on the eighteenth of June, in the year 
of our Lord 1799. 

The afternoon sun was warm on the five workmen there, 
busy upon doors and window-frames and wainscoting. A 
scent of pine-wood from a tent-like pile of planks outside 
the open door mingled itself with the scent of the elder- 
bushes which were spreading their summer snow close to 
the open window opposite; the slanting sunbeams shone 
through the transparent shavings that flew before the steady 
plane, and lit up the fine grain of the oak panelling which 
stood propped against the wall. On a heap of those soft 
shavings a rough gray shepherd-dog had made himself a 
pleasant bed, and was lying with his nose between his fore- 
paws, occasionally wrinkling his brows to cast a glance at 
the tallest of the five workmen, who was carving a shield in 
the centre of a wooden mantelpiece. It was to this work- 
man that the strong barytone belonged which was heard 
above the sound of plane and hammer, singing, — 

3 


ADAM BEDE 


“Awake, my soul, and with the sun 
Thy daily stage of duty run; 

Shake off dull sloth ...” 

Here some measurement was to be taken which required 
more concentrated attention, and the sonorous voice sub- 
sided into a low whistle; but it presently broke out again 
with renewed vigour, — 

“Let all thy converse be sincere. 

Thy conscience as the noonday clear.” 

Such a voice could only come from a broad chest, and the 
broad chest belonged to a large-boned muscular man nearly 
six feet high, with a back so flat and a head so well poised 
that when he drew himself up to take a more distant survey 
of his work, he had the air of a soldier standing at ease. The 
sleeve rolled up above the elbow showed an arm that was 
likely to win the prize for feats of strength; yet the long 
supple hand, with its broad finger-tips, looked ready for 
works of skill. In his tall stalwartness Adam Bede was a 
Saxon, and justified his name ; but the jet-black hair, made 
the more noticeable by its contrast with the light paper cap, 
and the keen glance of the dark eyes that shone from under 
strongly marked, prominent, and mobile eyebrows, indi- 
cated a mixture of Celtic blood. The face was large and 
roughly hewn, and when in repose had no other beauty than 
such as belongs to an expression of good-humoured, honest 
intelligence. 

It is clear at a glance that the next workman is Adam’s 
brother. He is nearly as tall ; he has the same type of 
features, the same hue of hair and complexion; but the 
strength of the family likeness seems only to render more 
conspicuous the remarkable difference of expression both 
in form and face. Seth’s broad shoulders have a slight 
stoop ; his eyes are gray ; his eyebrows have less prominence 
and more repose than his brother’s; and his glance, in- 
stead of being keen, is confiding and benignant. He has 
thrown off his paper cap, and you see that his hair is not 
thick and straight, like Adam’s, but thin and wavy, allow- 

4 


THE WORKSHOP 


ing you to discern the exact contour of a coronal arch that 
predominates very decidedly over the brow. 

The idle tramps always felt sure they could get a copper 
from Seth; they scarcely ever spoke to Adam. 

The concert of the tools and Adam’s voice was at last 
broken by Seth, who, lifting the door at which he had been 
working intently, placed it against the wall, and said, — 

“ There ! I Ve finished my door to-day, anyhow.” 

The workmen all looked up. Jim Salt, a burly red-haired 
man, known as Sandy Jim, paused from his planing; and 
Adam said to Seth, with a sharp glance of surprise, — 

“ What ! dost think thee ’st finished the door? ” 

“ Ay, sure,” said Seth, with answering surprise ; “ what ’s 
a- want ing to ’t? ” 

A loud roar of laughter from the other three workmen 
made Seth look round confusedly. Adam did not join in 
the laughter, but there was a slight smile on his face as he 
said, in a gentler tone than before, — 

'' Why, thee ’st forgot the panels.” 

The laughter burst out afresh as Seth clapped his hands 
to his head, and coloured over brow and crown. 

“ Hoorray ! ” shouted a small lithe fellow, called Wiry 
Ben, running forward and seizing the door. “ We ’ll hang 
up th’ door at fur end o’ th’ shop, an’ write on ’t ‘ Seth Bede, 
the Methody, his work.’ Here, Jim, lend ’s hould o’ th’ red- 
pot.” 

Nonsense ! ” said Adam. “ Let it alone, Ben Cranage, 
You ’ll mayhap be making such a slip yourself some day; 
you ’ll laugh o’ th’ other side o’ your mouth then.” 

“ Catch me at it, Adam ! It ’ll be a good while afore my 
head ’s full o’ th’ Methodies,” said Ben. 

“ Nay, but it ’s often full o’ drink ; and that ’s worse.” 
Ben, however, had now got the red-pot ” in his hand, 
and was about to begin writing his inscription, making, by 
way of preliminary, an imaginary 5 in the air. 

“ Let it alone, will you ? ” Adam called out, laying down 
his tools, striding up to Ben, and seizing his right shoulder. 
“ Let it alone, or I ’ll shake the soul out o’ your body ! ” 

Ben shook in Adam’s iron grasp ; but, like a plucky small 
man as he was, he didn’t mean to give in. With his left 


5 


ADAM BEDE 


hand he snatched the brush from his powerless right, and 
made a movement as if he would perform the feat of writ- 
ing with his left. In a moment Adam turned him round, 
seized his other shoulder, and pushing him along, pinned 
him against the wall. But now Seth spoke. 

“ Let be, Addy, let be. Ben will be joking. Why, he 's 
i’ the right to laugh at me, — I canna help laughing at my- 
self.^^ 

“ I shan’t loose him till he promises to let the door alone,” 
said Adam. 

Come, Ben, lad,” said Seth, in a persuasive tone, don’t 
let ’s have a quarrel about it. You know Adam will have 
his way. You may ’s well try to turn a wagon in a narrow 
lane. Say you ’ll leave the door alone, and make an end 
on ’t.” 

I binna frighted at Adam,” said Ben ; “ but I donna 
mind sayin’ as I’ 11 let ’t alone at your askin’, Seth.” 

“ Come, that ’s wise of you, Ben,” said Adam, laughing, 
and relaxing his grasp. 

They all returned to their work now ; but Wiry Ben, hav- 
ing had the worst in the bodily contest, was bent on retriev- 
ing that humiliation by a success in sarcasm. 

“ Which was ye thinkin’ on, Seth,” he began, — “ the 
pretty parson’s face or her sarmunt, when ye forgot the 
panels ? ” 

'' Come and hear her, Ben,” said Seth, good-humouredly ; 
“ she ’s going to preach on the Green to-night. Happen 
ye ’d get something to think on yourself then, instead o’ 
those wicked songs you ’re so fond on. Ye might get re- 
ligion, and that ’ud be the best day’s earnings y’ ever made.” 

All i’ good time for that, Seth ; I ’ll think about that 
when I ’m a-goin’ to settle i’ life ; bachelors does n’t want 
such heavy earnin’s. Happen I shall do the coortin’ an’ the 
religion both together, as ye do, Seth ; but ye wouldna ha’ 
me get converted, an’ chop in atween ye an’ the pretty 
preacher, an’ carry her aff ? ” 

“ No fear o’ that, Ben ; she ’s neither for you nor for me 
to win, I doubt. Only you come and hear her, and you 
won’t speak lightly on her again.” 

“ Well, I ’n half a mind t’ ha’ a look at her to-night, if 

6 


THE WORKSHOP 


there is n’t good company at th’ Holly Bush. What ’ll she 
take for her text ? Happen ye can tell me, Seth, if so be as 
I shouldna come up i’ time for ’t. Will ’t be. What come ye 
out for to see? A prophetess? Yea, I say unto you, and 
more than a prophetess, — a uncommon pretty young 
woman.” 

“ Come, Ben,” said Adam, rather sternly, “ you let the 
words o’ the Bible alone ; you ’re going too far now.” 

What ! are ye a-turnin’ roun’, Adam ? I thought ye 
war dead again th’ women preachin’, a while agoo ? ” 

“ Nay, I ’m not turnin' noway. I said nought about the 
women preachin’ : I said. You let the Bible alone. You ’ve 
got a jest-book, han’t you, as you’re rare and proud on? 
Keep your dirty fingers to that.” 

Why, y’ are gettin’ as big a saint as Seth. Y’ are goin’ 
to th’ preachin’ to-night, I should think. Ye ’ll do finely 
t’ lead the singin’. But I don’ know what Parson Irwine 
’ull say at his gran’ favright Adam Bede a-turnin’ Methody.” 

“ Never do you bother yourself about me, Ben. 1 ’m not 
a-going to turn Methodist any more nor you are, — though 
it ’s like enough you ’ll turn to something worse. Mester 
Irwine ’s got more sense nor to meddle wi’ people’s doing 
as they like in religion. That ’s between themselves and 
God, as he ’s said to me many a time.” 

“ Ay, ay ; but he ’s none so fond o’ your dissenters, for all 
that.” 

Maybe ; I ’m none so fond o’ Josh Tod’s thick ale, but I 
don’t hinder you from making a fool o’ yourself wi’ ’t.” 

There was a laugh at this thrust of Adam’s; but Seth 
said very seriously, — 

“ Nay, nay, Addy, thee mustna say as anybody’s religion ’s 
like thick ale. Thee dostna believe but what the dis- 
senters and the Methodists have got the root o’ the matter 
as well as the church folks.” 

“ Nay, Seth, lad ; I 'm not for laughing at no man’s re- 
ligion. Let ’em follow their consciences, that ’s all. Only 
I think it ’ud be better if their consciences ’ud let ’em stay 
quiet i’ the church, — there ’s a deal to be learnt there. And 
there ’s such a thing as being over-speritial ; we must have 
something beside Gospel i’ this world. Look at the canals, 

7 


ADAM BEDE 


aimh’ aqueducs, an’ th’ coal-pit engines, and Arkwright’s 
tniUs there at Cromford; a man must learn summat beside 
Gospel to make them things, I reckon. But t’ hear some 
o’ them preachers, you ’d think as a man must be doing 
nothing all s life but shutting ’s eyes and looking what ’s 
a-going on inside him. I know a man must have the love 
o’ God in his soul, and the Bible ’s God’s word. But what 
does the Bible say? Why, it says as God put his sperrit 
into the workman as built the tabernacle, to make him do 
all the carved work and things as wanted a nice hand. And 
this is my way o’ lookng at it : there ’s the sperrit o’ God in 
all things and all times, — week-day as well as Sunday, — 
and i’ the great works and inventions, and i’ the figuring and 
the mechanics. And God helps us with our headpieces and 
our hands as well as with our souls ; and if a man does bits 
o’ jobs out o’ working hours, — builds a oven for ’s wife to 
save her from going to the bake-house, or scrats at his bit 
o’ garden and makes two potatoes grow istead o’ one, — 
he ’s doing more good, and he ’s just as near to God, as if he 
was running after some preacher and a-praying and a-groan- 
mg. 

“Well done, Adam!” said Sandy Jim, who had paused 
from his planing to shift his planks while Adam was speak- 
ing; “ that ’s the best sarmunt I ’ve beared this long while, 
^y th’ same token, my wife ’s been a-plaguin’ on me to 
build her a oven this twelvemont.” 

“ There ’s reason in what thee say’st, Adam,” observed 
Seth, gravely. “ But thee know’st thyself as it ’s hearing 
the preachers thee find’st so much fault with has turned 
many an idle fellow into an industrious un. It ’s the preacher 
as empties th’ alehouse ; and if a man gets religion, he ’ll do 
his work none the worse for that.” 

“ On’y he ’ll lave the panels out o’ th’ doors sometimes, 
eh, Seth? ” said Wiry Ben. 

“ Ah, Ben, you ’ve got a joke again’ me as ’ll last you 
your life. But it isna religion as was i’ fault there : it was 
Seth Bede, as was allays a wool-gathering chap; and re- 
ligion hasna cured him, the more ’s the pity.” 

“ Ne’er heed me, Seth,” said Wiry Ben. “ Y’ are a down- 
right good-hearted chap, panels or no panels ; an’ ye donna 

8 


THE WORKSHOP 


set up your bristles at every bit o’ fun, like some o’ your 
kin, as is mayhap cliverer,” 

“ Seth, lad,” said Adam, taking no notice of the sarcasm 
against himself, “ thee mustna take me unkind. I wasna 
driving at thee in what I said just now. Some ’s got one 
way o’ looking at things, and some ’s got another.” 

Nay, nay, Addy, thee mean’st me no unkindness,” said 
Seth ; “ I know that well enough. Thee ’t like thy dog 
Gyp, — thee bark’st at me sometimes, but thee allays lick’st 
my hand after.” 

All hands worked on in silence for some minutes, until the 
church clock began to strike six. Before the first stroke 
had died away, Sandy Jim had loosed his plane and was 
reaching his jacket ; Wiry Ben had left a screw half driven 
in, and thrown his screw-driver into his tool-basket; Mum 
Taft, who, true to his name, had kept silence throughout 
the previous conversation, had flung down his hammer as he 
was in the act of lifting it ; and Seth, too, had straightened 
his back, and was putting out his hand towards his paper 
cap. Adam alone had gone on with his work as if nothing 
had happened. But observing the cessation of the tools, he 
looked up, and said, in a tone of indignation, — 

“ Look there, now ! I can’t abide to see men throw away 
their tools i’ that way, the minute the clock begins to strike, 
as if they took no pleasure i’ their work, and was afn'^ ’ ’ 

doing a stroke too much.” 

Seth looked a little conscious, and began to be slower in 
his prreparations for going; but Mum Taft broke silence, 
and said, — 

“ Ay, ay, Adam, lad, ye talk like a young un. When y’ 
are six-an’-forty like me, istid o’ six-an’-twenty, ye wonna 
be so flush o’ workin’ for nought.” 

Nonsense ! ” said Adam, still wrathful ; “ what ’s age got 
to do with it, I wonder? Ye arena getting stiff yet, I reckon. 
I hate to see a man’s arms drop down as if he was shot, 
before the clock ’s fairly struck, just as if he ’d never a bit o’ 
pride and delight in ’s work. The very grindstone ’ull go on 
turning a bit after you loose it.” 

“ Bodderation, Adam ! ” exclaimed Wiry Ben ; lave a 
chap aloon, will ’ee? Ye war a-finding faut wi’ preachers 

9 


ADAM BEDE 


awhile agoo, — y’ are fond enough o’ preachin’ yoursen. Ye 
may like work better nor play, but I like play better nor 
work ; that ’ll ’commodate ye, — it laves ye th’ more to do.” 

With this exit speech, which he considered effective. Wiry 
Ben shouldered his basket and left the workshop, quickly 
followed by Mum Taft and Sandy Jim. Seth lingered, and 
looked wistfully at Adam, as if he expected him to say some- 
thing. 

“ Shalt go home before thee go’st to the preaching ? 
Adam asked, looking up. 

Nay ; I ’ve got my hat and things at Will Maskery’s. I 
shan’t be home before going for ten. I ’ll happen see Dinah 
Morris safe home, if she 's willing. There ’s nobody conies 
with her from Poyser’s, thee know’st.” 

“ Then I ’ll tell mother not to look for thee,” said Adam. 

“ Thee artna going to Poyser’s thyself to-night ? ” said 
Seth, rather timidly, as he turned to leave the workshop. 

“ Nay, I ’m going to th’ school.” 

Hitherto Gyp had kept his comfortable bed, only lifting 
up his head and watching Adam more closely as he noticed 
the other workmen departing. But no sooner did Adam put 
his ruler in his pocket, and begin to twist his apron round 
his waist, than Gyp ran forward and looked up in his mas- 
ter’s face with patient expectation. If Gyp had had a tail, he 
would doubtless have wagged it ; but being destitute of that 
vehicle for his emotions, he was, like many other worthy 
person *es, destined to appear more phlegmatic than Nature 
had ma^e him. , 

“ What ! art ready for the basket, eh. Gyp ? ” said Adam, 
with the same gentle modulation of voice as when he spoke 
to Seth. 

Gyp jumped, and gave a short bark, as much as to say, 
“ Of course.” Poor fellow ! he had not a great range of ex- 
pression. 

The basket v^as the one which on workdays held Adam’s 
and Seth’s dinner; and no official, walking in procession, 
could look more resolutely unconscious of all acquaintances 
than Gyp with his basket, trotting at his master’s heels. 

On leaving the workshop Adam locked the door, took 
the key out, and carried it to the house on the other side of 


10 


THE WORKSHOP 


the woodyard. It was a low house, with smooth gray thatch 
♦and buff walls, looking pleasant and mellow in the evening 
light. The leaded windows were bright and speckless, and 
the door-stone was as clean as a white boulder at ebb tide. 
On the door-stone stood a clean old woman, in a dark- 
striped linen gown, a red kerchief, and a linen' cap, talking 
to some speckled fowls which appeared to have been drawn 
^owards her by an illusory expectation of cold potatoes or 
barley. The old woman's sight seemed to be dim, for she 
did not recognize Adam till he said, — ^ 

“ Here ’s the key, Dolly ; lay it down for me in the house, 
will you 

“ Ay, sure : but wunna ye come in, Adam? Miss Mary ^s 
i’ th’ house, and Mester Burge ’ull be back anon ; he ’d be 
glad t’ ha’ ye to supper wi’ ’m, I ’ll be ’s warrand.” 

“ No, Dolly, thank you ; I ’m off home. Good evening.” 

Adam hastened with long strides. Gyp close to his heels, 
out of the workyard, and along the highroad leading away 
from the village and down to the valley. As he reached the 
foot of the slope, an elderly horseman, with his portmanteau 
strapped behind him, stopped his horse when Adam had 
passed him, and turned round to have another long look at 
th€ stalwart workman in paper cap, leather breeches, and 
dark-blue worsted stockings. 

Adam, unconscious of the admiration he was exciting, 
presently struck across the fields, and now broke ^^nt into 
the tune which had all day long been running in his j ^ jad : — 


Let all thy converse be sincere, 

Thy conscience as the noonday clear; 

For God’s all-seeing eye surveys 

Thy secret thoughts, thy works and ways.” 


CHAPTER H. 


THE PREACHING. 


BOUT a quarter to seven there was an unusual appear- 



ance of excitement in the village of Hayslope, and 
through the whole length of its little street, from the 
Donnithorne Arms to the churchyard gate, the inhab- 


II 


ADAM BEDE 


itants had evidently been drawn out of their houses by 
something more than the pleasure of lounging in the * 
evening sunshine. The Donnithorne Arms stood at the 
entrance of the village, and a small farmyard and stack- 
yard which flanked it, indicating that there was a pretty 
take of land attached to the inn, gave the traveller a 
promise of good feed for himself and his horse, which 
might well console him for the ignorance in which the 
weather-beaten sign left him as to the heraldic bearings of 
that ancient family, the Donnithornes. Mr. Casson, the 
landlord, had been for some time standing at the door with 
his hands in his pockets, balancing himself on his heels and 
toes, and looking towards a piece of unenclosed ground, with 
a maple in the middle of it, which he knew to be the destina- 
tion of certain grave-looking men and women whom he had 
observed passing at intervals. 

Mr. Casson’s person was by no means of that common type 
which can be allowed to pass without description. On a 
front view it appeared to consist principally of two spheres, 
bearing about the same relation to each other as the earth 
and the moon ; that is to say, the lower sphere might be said, 
at a rough guess, to be thirteen times larger than the upper, 
which naturally performed the function of a mere satellite 
and tributary. But here the resemblance ceased, for Mr. 
Casson’s head was not at all a melancholy-looking satellite, 
nor was it a spotty globe,” as Milton has irreverently called 
the moon ; on the contrary, no head and face could look more 
sleek and healthy, and its expression, which was chiefly con- 
fined to a pair of round and ruddy cheeks, the slight knot 
and interruptions forming the nose and eyes being scarcely 
worth mention, was one of jolly contentment, only tempered 
by that sense of personal dignity which usually made itself 
felt in his attitude and bearing. This sense of dignity could 
hardly be considered excessive in a man who had been butler 
to “ the family ” for fifteen years, and who in his present high 
position was necessarily very much in contact with his in- 
feriors. How to reconcile his dignity with the satisfaction of 
his curiosity by walking towards the Green, was the problem 
that Mr. Casson had been revolving in his mind for the last 
five minutes ; but when he had partly solved it by taking his 


12 


THE PREACHING 


up the hill, — a carpenter, a tall broad-shouldered fellow with 
black hair and black eyes, marching along like a soldier. 
We want such fellows as he to lick the French.” 

“ Ay, sir, that ’s Adam Bede, that is, I ’ll be bound, — 
Thias Bede’s son, — everybody knows him hereabout. He ’s 
an uncommon clever, stiddy fellow, an’ wonderful strong. 
Lord bless you, sir, — if you ’ll hexcuse me for saying so, — 
he can walk forty mile a day, an’ lift a matter o’ sixty ston’. 
He ’s an uncommon favourite wi’ the gentry, sir : Captain 
Donnithorne and Parson Irwine meks a fine fuss wi’ him. 
But he ’s a little lifted up an’ peppery-like.” 

“ Well, good evening to you, landlord; I must get on.” 

“ Your servant, sir; good evenin’.” 

The traveller put his horse into a quick walk up the vil- 
lage; but when he approached the Green, the beauty of the 
view that lay on his right hand, the singular contrast pre- 
sented by the groups of villagers with the knot of Methodists 
near the maple, and perhaps yet more, curiosity to see the 
young female preacher, proved too much for his anxiety to 
get to the end of his journey, and he paused. 

The Green lay at the extremity of the village, and from it 
the road branched off in two directions, — one leading 
farther up the hill by the church, and the other winding gen- 
tly down toward the valley. On one side of the Green that 
led towards the church, the broken line of thatched cottages 
w-as continued nearly to the churchyard gate; but on the 
opposite, northwestern side, there was nothing to obstruct 
the view of gently swelling meadow, and wooded valley, and 
dark masses of distant hill. That rich undulating district of 
Loamshire to which Hayslope belonged, lies close to a grim 
outskirt of Stonyshire, overlooked by its barren hills as a 
pretty blooming sister may sometimes be seen linked in the 
arm of a rugged, tall, swarthy brother; and in two or three 
hours’ ride the traveller might exchange a bleak treeless 
region, intersected by lines of cold gray stone, for one where 
his road wound under the shelter of woods, or up swelling 
hills, muffled with hedgerows and long meadow-grass and 
thick corn ; and where at every turn he came upon some fine 
old country-seat nestled in the valley or crowning the slope, 
some homestead with its long length of barn and its cluster 

15 


ADAM BEDE 


of golden ricks, some gray steeple looking out from a pretty 
confusion of trees and thatch and dark-red tiles. It was just 
such a picture as this last that Hayslope Church had made to 
the traveller as he began to mount the gentle slope leading 
to its pleasant uplands; and now from his station near the 
Green he had before him in one view nearly all the other typi- 
cal features of this pleasant land. High up against the hori- 
zon were the huge conical masses of hill, like giant mounds 
intended to fortify this region of corn and grass against the 
keen and hungry winds of the north; not distant enough to 
be clothed in purple mystery, but with sombre greenish sides 
visibly speckled with sheep, whose motion was only revealed 
by memory, not detected by sight ; wooed from day to day by 
the changing hours, but responding with no change in them- 
selves, — left forever grim and sullen after the flush of morn- 
ing, the winged gleams of the April noonday, the parting 
crimson glory of the ripening summer sun. And directly 
below them the eye rested on a more advanced line of hang- 
ing woods, divided by bright patches of pasture or furrowed 
crops, and not yet deepened into the uniform leafy curtains 
of high summer, but still showing the warm tints of the 
young oak and the tender green of the ash and lime. Then 
came the valley, where the woods grew thicker, as if they had 
rolled down and hurried together from the patches left 
smooth on the slope, that they might take the better care of 
the tall mansion which lifted its parapets and sent its faint 
blue summer smoke among them. Doubtless there was a 
large sweep of park and a broad glassy pool in front of that 
mansion, but the swelling slope of meadow would not let our 
traveller see them from the village green. He saw instead a 
foreground which was just as lovely, — the level sunlight 
lying like transparent gold among the gently curving stems 
of the feathered grass and the tall red sorrel, and the white 
umbels of the hemlocks lining the bushy hedgerows. It was 
that moment in summer when the sound of the scythe being 
whetted makes us cast more lingering looks at the flower- 
sprinkled tresses of the meadows. 

He might have seen other beauties in the landscape if he 
had turned a little in his saddle and looked eastward, beyond 
Jonathan Burge’s pasture and woodyard towards the green 

i6 


THE PREACHING 


cornfields and walnut-trees of the Hall Farm ; but apparently 
there was more interest for him in the living groups close at 
hand. Every generation in the village was there, — from old 
“ Feyther Taft ” in his brown worsted nightcap, who was 
bent nearly double, but seemed tough enough to keep on his 
legs for a long while, leaning on his short stick, down to the 
babies with their little round heads lolling forward in quilted 
linen, caps. Now and then there was a new arrival ; perhaps 
a slouching labourer, who, having eaten his supper, came out 
to look at the unusual scene with a slow bovine gaze, willing 
to hear what any one had to say in explanation of it, but by 
no means excited enough to ask a question. But all took 
care not to join the Methodists on the Green, and identify 
themselves in that way with the expectant audience; for 
there was not one of them that would not have disclaimed the 
imputation of having come out to hear the “ preacher-wom- 
an,” — they had only come out to see “ what war a-goin’ 
on, like.” The men were chiefly gathered in the neighbour- 
hood of the blacksmith’s shop. But do not imagine them 
gathered in a knot. Villagers never swarm; a whisper is 
unknown among them, and they seem almost as incapable 
of an undertone as a cow or a stag. Your true rustic turns 
his back on his interlocutor, throwing a question over his 
shoulder as if he meant to run away from the answer, and 
walking a step or two farther off when the interest of the dia- 
logue culminates. So the group in the vicinity of the black- 
smith’s door was by no means a close one, and formed no 
screen in front of Chad Cranage, the blacksmith himself, who 
stood with his black brawny arms folded, leaning against 
the door-post, and occasionally sending forth a bellowing 
laugh at his own jokes, giving them a marked preference 
over the sarcasms of Wiry Ben, who had renounced the 
pleasures of the Holly Bush for the sake of seeing life under 
a new form. But both styles of wit were treated with equal 
contempt by Mr. Joshua Rann. Mr. Rann’s leathern apron 
and subdued griminess can leave no one in any doubt that 
he is the village shoemaker ; the thrusting out of his chin and 
stomach, and the twirling of his thumbs are more subtle in- 
dications, intended to prepare unwary strangers for the dis- 
covery that they are in the presence of the parish clerk. 

17 


2 


ADAM BEDE 


“ Old Joshway,” as he is irreverently called by his neigh- 
bours, is in a state of simmering indignation ; but he has not 
yet opened his lips except to say, in a resounding bass under- 
tone, like the tuning of a violoncello, “ Sehon, King of the 
Amorites: for His mercy endureth forever; and Og, the 
King of Basan: for His mercy endureth forever,” — a quo- 
tation which may seem to have slight bearing on the present 
occasion, but, as with every other anomaly, adequate knowl- 
edge will show it to be a natural sequence. Mr. Rann was 
inwardly maintaining the dignity of the Church in the face 
of this scandalous irruption of Methodism ; and as that dig- 
nity was bound up with his own sonorous utterance of the 
responses, his argument naturally suggested a quotation 
from the Psalm he had read the last Sunday afternoon. 

The stronger curiosity of the women had drawn them quite 
to the edge of the Green, where they could examine more 
closely the Quaker-like costume and odd deportment of 
the female Methodists. Underneath the maple there was a 
small cart which had been brought from the wheel- 
wright’s to serve as a pulpit, and round this a couple 
of benches and a few chairs had been placed. Some 
of the Methodists were resting on these, with , their eyes 
closed, as if rapt in prayer or meditation. Others chose 
to continue standing, and had turned their faces towards 
the village with a look of melancholy compassion, which 
was highly amusing to Bessy Cranage, the blacksmith’s 
buxom daughter, known to her neighbours as Chad’s 
Bess, who wondered “ why the folks war a-makin’ faces a 
that ’ns.” Chad’s Bess was the object of peculiar compas- 
sion, because her hair, being turned back under a cap which 
was set at the top of her head, exposed to view an ornament 
of which she was much prouder than of her red cheeks; 
namely, a pair of large round ear-rings with false garnets in 
them, — ornaments contemned not only by the Methodists, 
but by her own cousin and namesake Timothy’s Bess, who 
with much cousinly feeling often wished “ them ear-rings ” 
might come to good. 

Timothy’s Bess, though retaining her maiden appellation 
among her familiars, had long been the wife of Sandy Jim, 
and possessed a handsome set of matronly jewels, of which 

i8 


THE PREACHING 


it is enough to mention the heavy baby she was rocking in 
her arms, and the sturdy fellow of five in knee-breeches and 
red legs, who had a rusty milk-can round his neck by way 
of drum, and was very carefully avoided by Chad’s small 
terrier. This young olive-branch, notorious under the name 
of Timothy’s Bess’s Ben, being of an inquiring disposition, 
unchecked by any false modesty, had advanced beyond the 
group of women and children, and was walking round the 
Methodists, looking up their faces with his mouth wide open, 
and beating his stick against the milk-can by way of musical 
accompaniment. But one of the elderly women bending 
down to take him by the shoulder, with an air of grave re- 
monstrance, Timothy’s Bess’s Ben first kicked out vigorous- 
ly, then took to his heels, and sought refuge behind his 
father’s legs. 

“ Ye gallows young dog,” said Sandy Jim, with some pa- 
ternal pride, “if ye donna keep that stick quiet I ’ll tek it 
from ye. What d’ ye mane by kickin’ foulks ? ” 

“ Here ! gie him here to me, Jim,” said Chad Cranage ; 
“ I ’ll tie him up an’ shoe him as I do th’ bosses. Well, Hes- 
ter Casson,” he continued, as that personage sauntered up 
towards the group of men, “ how are ye t’ naight ? Are ye 
coom t’ help groon? They say folks allays groon when 
they ’re hearkenin’ to th’ Methodies, as if they war bad i’ th’ 
inside. I mane to groon as loud as your cow did th’ other 
naight, an’ then the praicher ’ull think I ’m i’ th’ raight way.” 

“ I ’d advise you not to be up to nonsense, Chad,” said Mr. 
Casson, with some dignity ; “ Poyser would n’t like to hear 
as his wife’s niece was treated any ways disrespectful, for all 
he may n’t be fond of her taking on herself to preach.” 

“ Ay, an’ she ’s a pleasant-looked un too,” said Wiry Ben. 
“ I ’ll stick up for the pretty women preachin’ ; I know they ’d 
persuade me over a deal sooner nor th’ ugly men. I shouldna 
wonder if I turn Methody afore the night ’s out, an’ begin to 
coort the preacher, like Seth Bede.” 

“ Why, Seth ’s looking rather too high, I should think,” 
said Mr. Casson. “ This woman ’s kin would n’t like her to 
demean herself to a common carpenter.” 

“ Tchu ! ” said Ben, with a long treble intonation, “ what ’s 
folk’s kin got to do wi’ ’t? Not a chip. Poyser’s wife may 

19 


ADAM BEDE 


turn her nose up an’ forget bygones ; but this Dinah Morris, 
they tell me, ’s as poor as iver she was, — works at a mill, 
an ’s much ado to keep hersen. A strappin’ young carpenter 
as is a ready-made Methody, like Seth, wouldna be a bad 
match for her. Why, Poysers make as big a fuss wi’ Adam 
Bede as if he war a nevvy o’ their own.” 

“Idle talk! idle talk!” said Mr. Joshua Rann. '“Adam 
an’ Seth’s two men; you wunna fit them two wi’ the same 
last.” 

“Maybe,” said Wiry Ben, contemptuously; “but Seth’s 
the lad for me, though he war a Methody twice o’er. I ’m 
fair beat wi’ Seth, for I ’ve been teasin’ him iver sin’ we ’ve 
been workin’ together, an’ he bears me no more malice nor 
a lamb. An’ he ’s a stout-hearted feller too ; for when we 
saw the old tree all afire a-comin’ across the fields one night, 
an’ we thought as it war a boguy, Seth made no more ado, 
but he up to ’t as bold as a constable. Why, there he comes 
out o’ Will Maskery’s ; an’ there ’s Will hisself, lookin’ as 
meek as if he couldna knock a nail o’ the head for fear o’ 
hurtin’ ’t. An’ there ’s the pretty preacher-woman ! My eye, 
she ’s got her bonnet off. I mun go a bit nearer.” 

Several of the men followed Ben’s lead, and the traveller 
pushed his horse on to the Green, as Dinah walked rather 
quickly, and in advance of her companions, towards the 
cart under the maple-tree. While she was near Seth’s tall 
figure, she looked short, but when she had mounted the cart, 
and was away from all comparison, she seemed above the 
middle height of woman, though in reality she did not 
exceed it, — an effect which was due to the slimness of 
her figure, and the simple line of her black stuff dress. The 
stranger was struck with surprise as he saw her approach 
and mount the cart, — surprise, not so much at the feminine 
delicacy of her appearance as at the total absence of self- 
consciousness in her demeanour. He had made up his mind 
to see her advance with a measured step, and a demure so- 
lemnity of countenance ; he had felt sure that her face would 
be mantled with the smile of conscious saintship, or else 
charged with denunciatory bitterness. He knew but two 
types of Methodist, — the ecstatic and the bilious. But 
Dinah walked as simply as if she were going to market, 

20 


r 


THE PREACHING 


and seemed as unconscious of her outward appearance as a 
little boy. There was no blush, no tremulousness, which 
said, “ I know you think me a pretty woman, too young to 
preach ; ” no casting up or down of the eyelids, no com- 
pression of the lips, no attitude of the arms, that said, ‘‘ But 
you must think of me as a saint.” She held no book in her 
ungloved hands, but let them hang down lightly crossed 
before her, as she stood and turned her gray eyes on the 
people. There was no keenness in the eyes ; they seemed 
rather to be shedding love than making observations ; they 
had the liquid look which tells that the mind is full of what 
it has to give out, rather than impressed by external objects. 
Sht stood with her left hand towards the descending sun, 
and leafy boughs screened her from its rays ; but in this 
sober light the delicate colouring of her face seemed to 
gather a calm vividness, like flowers at evening. It was a 
small oval face, of a uniform transparent whiteness, with an 
egg-like line of cheek and chin, a full but firm mouth, a 
delicate nostril, and a low perpendicular brow, surmounted 
by a rising arch of parting between smooth locks of pale 
reddish hair. The hair was drawn straight back behind the 
ears, and covered, except for an inch or two above the brow, 
by a net Quaker cap. The eyebrows, of the same colour as 
the hair, were perfectly horizontal and firmly pencilled ; the 
eyelashes, though no darker, were long and abundant ; noth- 
ing was left blurred or unfinished. It was one of those faces 
that make one think of white flowers with light touches of 
colour on their pure petals. The eyes had no peculiar 
beauty, beyond that of expression; they looked so simple, 
so candid, so gravely loving, that no accusing scowl, no 
light sneer could help melting away before their glance. 
Joshua Rann gave a long cough, as if he were clearing his 
throat in order to come to a new understanding with him- 
self ; Chad Cranage lifted up his leather skull-cap and 
scratched his head ; and Wiry Ben wondered how Seth had 
the pluck to think of courting her. 

A sweet woman,” the stranger said to himself ; “ but 
surely Nature never meant her for a preacher.” 

Perhaps he was one of those who think that Nature has 
theatrical properties, and, with the considerate view of fa- 


21 


ADAM BEDE 


cilitating art and psychology, “ makes up ” her characters, 
so that there may be no mistake about them. But Dinah 
began to speak. 

“ Dear friends,” she said, in a clear but not loud voice, 
“ let us pray for a blessing.” 

She closed her eyes, and hanging her head down a little, 
continued in the same moderate tone, as if speaking to some 
one quite near her : — 

“ Saviour of sinners ! when a poor woman, laden with 
sins, went out to the well to draw water, she found Thee 
sitting at the well. She knew Thee not ; she had not 
sought Thee ; her mind was dark ; her life was unholy. 
But Thou didst speak to her. Thou didst teach her. Thou 
didst show her that her life lay open before Thee, and yet 
Thou wast ready to give her that blessing which she had 
never sought. Jesus, Thou art in the midst of us, and Thou 
knowest all men ; if there is any here like that poor woman, 
— if their minds are dark, their lives unholy, — if they have 
come out not seeking Thee, not desiring to be taught, — 
deal with them according to the free mercy which Thou 
didst show to her. Speak to them. Lord ; open their ears 
to my message ; bring their sins to their minds, and make 
them thirst for that salvation which Thou art ready to give. 

“ Lord, Thou art with Thy people still : they see Thee in 
the night-watches, and their hearts burn within them as 
Thou talkest with them by the way. And Thou art near 
to those who have not known Thee: open their eyes that 
they may see Thee, — see Thee weeping over them, and say- 
ing, ' Ye will not come unto me that ye might have life,^ — 
see Thee hanging on the cross and saying, ‘ Father, for- 
give them, for they know not what they do,’ — see Thee as 
Thou wilt come again in Thy glory to judge them at the 
last. Amen.” 

Dinah opened her eyes again and paused, looking at the 
group of villagers, who were now gathered rather more 
closely on her right hand. 

“ Dear friends,” she began, raising her voice a little, you 
have all of you been to church, and I think you must have 
heard the clergyman read these words : ‘ The Spirit of the 
Lord is upon me, because he hath anointed me to preach 


22 


THE PREACHING 


the Gospel to the poor.’ Jesus Christ spoke those words — 
he said he came to preach the Gospel to the poor. I don’t 
know whether you ever thought about those words much; 
but I will tell you when 1 remember first hearing them. It 
was on just such a sort of evening as this, when I was a little 
girl, and my aunt as brought me up took me to hear a good 
man preach out of doors, just as we are here. I remember 
his face well. He was a very old man, and had very long 
white hair ; his voice was very soft and beautiful, not like 
any voice I had ever heard before. I was a little girl, and 
scarcely knew anything; and this old man seemed to me 
such a different sort of a man from anybody I had ever seen 
before, that I thought he had perhaps come down from the 
sky to preach to us, and I said, ‘ Aunt, will he go back to 
the sky to-night, like the picture in the Bible ? ’ 

“ That man of God was Mr. Wesley, who spent his life 
in doing what our blessed Lord did, — preaching the Gospel 
to the poor ; and he entered into his rest eight years ago. I 
came to know more about him years after, but I was a fool- 
ish, thoughtless child then, and I remembered only one 
thing he told us in his sermon. He told us as ‘ Gospel ’ 
meant ‘ good news.’ The Gospel, you know, is what the 
Bible tells us about God. 

“ Think of that now ! Jesus Christ did really come down 
from heaven, as I, like a silly child, thought Mr. Wesley did; 
and what he came down for, was to tell good news about 
God to the poor. Why, you and me, dear friends, are poor. 
We have been brought up in poor cottages, and have been 
reared on oat-cake, and lived coarse ; and we have n’t been 
to school much, nor read books, and we don’t know much 
about anything but what happens just round us. We are 
just the sort of people that want to hear good news. For 
when anybody ’s well off, they don’t much mind about hear- 
ing news from distant parts ; but if a poor man or woman 
’s in trouble and has hard work to make out a living, they 
like to have a letter to tell ’en; they ’ve got a friend as will 
help ’em. To be sure, we can’t help knowing something 
about God, even if we ’ve never heard the Gospel, the good 
news that our Saviour brought us. For we know everything 
comes from God : don’t you say almost every day, ‘ This 


23 


ADAM BEDE 


and that will happen, please God; ’ and ‘ We shall begin to 
cut the grass soon, please God to send us a little more sun- 
shine ’? We know very well we are altogether in the hands 
of God : we did n’t bring ourselves into the world, we can’t 
keep ourselves alive while we ’re sleeping; the daylight, 
and the wind, and the corn, and the cows to give us milk, — 
everything we have comes from God. And he gave us our 
souls, and put love between parents and children and hus- 
band and wife. But is that as much as we want to know 
about God? We see he is great and mighty, and can do 
what he will; we are lost, as if we was struggling in great 
waters, when we try to think of him. 

But perhaps doubts come into your mind like this : Can 
God take much notice of us poor people? Perhaps he only 
made the world for the great and the wise and the rich. It 
does n’t cost him much to give us our little handful of vic- 
tual and bit of clothing; but how do we know he cares for 
us any more than we care for the worms and things in the 
garden, so as we rear our carrots and onions? Will God 
take care of us when wx die, and has he any comfort for us 
when we are lame and sick and helpless? Perhaps, too, he 
is angry with us ; else why does the blight come, and the 
bad harvests, and the fever, and all sorts of pain and trouble ? 
For our life is full of trouble, and if God sends us good, he 
seems to send bad too. How is it ? how is it ? 

“ Ah ! dear friends, we are in sad want of good news 
about God; and what does other good news signify if we 
haven’t that? For everything else comes to an end, and 
when w^e die we leave it all. But God lasts when everything 
else is gone. What shall we do if he is not our friend ? ” 

Then Dinah told how the good news had ^een brought, 
and how the mind of God towards the poor had been made 
manifest in the life of Jesus, dwelling on its lowliness and its 
acts of mercy. 

“ So you see, dear friends,” she went on, “ Jesus spent his 
time almost all in doing good to poor people ; he preached 
out of doors to them, and he made friends of poor workmen, 
and taught them and took pains with them. Not but what 
he did good to the rich too, for he was full of love to all men ; 
only he saw as the poor were more in want of his help. So 

24 


THE PREACHING 


he cured the lame and the sick and the blind, and h.»t worked 
miracles to i'eed the hungry, because, he said, he was sorry 
for them ; and he was very kind to the little children, and 
comforted those who had lost their friends; and he spoke 
very tenderly to poor sinners that were sorry for their sins. 

“ Ah ! would n’t you love such a man if you saw him, — 
if he was here in this village? What a kind heart he must 
have ! What a friend he would be to go to in trouble ! How 
pleasant it must be to be taught by him ! 

Well, dear friends, who was this man? Was he only a 
good man, — a very good man, and no more, — like our 
dear Mr. Wesley,, who has been taken from us? . . . He 
was the Son of God, — ‘ in the image of the Father,’ the 
Bible says ; that means, just like God, who is the beginning 
and end of all things, — the God we want to know about. 
So then, all the love chat Jesus showed to the poor is the 
same love that God has for us. We can understand what 
Jesus felt, because he came in a body like ours, and spoke 
words such as we speak to each other. We were afraid to 
think what God was before, — the God who made the world 
and the sky and the thunder and lightning. We could 
never see him ; we could only see the things he had made ; 
and some of these things was very terrible, so as we might 
well tremble when we thought of him. But our blessed 
Saviour has showed us what God is in a way us poor ig- 
norant people can understand ; he has showed us what 
God’s heart is, what are his feelings towards us. 

“ But let us see a little more about what Jesus came on 
earth for. Another time he said, ‘ I came to seek and to 
save that which was lost ; ’ and another time, ^ I came not 
to call the righteous but sinners to repentance.’ 

“ The lost! . . . Sinners! . . . Ah ! dear friends, does that 
mean you and me ? ” 

Hitherto the traveller had been chained to the spot 
against his will by the charm of Dinah’s mellow treble tones, 
which had a variety of modulation like that of a fine instru- 
ment touched with the unconscious skill of musical instinct. 
The simple things she said seemed like novelties, as a melody 
strikes us with a new feeling when we hear it sung by the 
pure voice of a boyish chorister ; the quiet depth of convic- 
ts 


ADAM BEDE 


tion with which she spoke seemed in itself an evidence for 
the truth of her message. He saw that she had thoroughly 
arrested her hearers. The villagers had pressed nearer to 
her, and there was no longer anything but grave attention 
on all faces. She spoke slowly, though quite fluently, often 
pausing after a question, or before any transition of ideas. 
There was no change of attitude, no gesture ; the effect of 
her speech was produced entirely by the inflections of her 
voice ; and when she came to the question, “ Will God take 
care of us when we die?’’ she uttered it in such a tone of 
plaintive appeal that the tears came into some of the hardest 
eyes. The stranger had ceased to doubt, as he had done 
at the first glance, that she could fix the attention of her 
rougher hearers; but still he wondered whether she could 
have that power of rousing their more violent emotions 
which must surely be a necessary seal of her vocation as a 
Methodist preacher, until she came to the words, ‘‘ Lost ! — 
Sinners ! ” when there was a great change in her voice and 
manner. She had made a long pause before the exclama- 
tion, and the pause seemed to be filled by agitating thoughts 
that showed themselves in her features. Her pale face be- 
came paler ; the circles under her eyes deepened, as they do 
when tears half gather without falling ; and the mild loving 
eyes took an expression of appalled pity, as if she had sud- 
denly discerned a destroying angel hovering over the heads 
of the people. Her voice became deep and muffled, but there 
was still no gesture. Nothing could be less like the ordinary 
type of the Ranter than Dinah. She was not preaching as 
she heard others preach, but speaking directly from her own 
emotions, and under the inspiration of her own simple faith. 

But now she had entered into a new current of feeling. 
Her manner became less calm, her utterance more rapid 
and agitated, as she tried to bring home to the people their 
guilt, their wilful darkness, their state of disobedience to 
God, — as she dwelt on the hatefulness of sin, the Divine 
holiness, and the sufferings of the Saviour, by which a way 
had been opened for their salvation. At last it seemed as 
if, in her yearning desire to reclaim the lost sheep, she could 
not be satisfied by addressing her hearers as a body. She 
appealed first to one and then to another, beseeching them 

26 


THE PREACHING 


with tears to turn to God while there was yet time; paint- 
ing to them the desolation of their souls, lost in sin, feeding 
on the husks of this miserable world, far away from God, 
their Father; and then the love of the Saviour, who was 
waiting and watching for their return. 

There was many a responsive sigh and groan from her 
fellow-Methodists ; but the village mind does not easily take 
fire, and a little smouldering vague anxiety, that might 
easily die out again, was the utmost effect Dinah’s preach- 
ing had wrought in them at present. Yet no one had re- 
tired, except the children and “ old Feyther Taft,” who be- 
ing too deaf to, catch many words, had some time ago gone 
back to his ingle-nook. Wiry Ben was feeling very uncom- 
fortable, and almost wishing he had not come to hear Dinah ; 
he thought what she said w'ould haunt him somehow. Yet 
he could n’t help liking to look at her and listen to her, 
though he dreaded every moment that she would fix her 
eyes on him, and address him in particular. She had al- 
ready addressed Sandy Jim, who was now holding the baby 
to relieve his wife ; and the big soft-hearted man had rubbed 
away some tears with his fist, with a confused intention of 
being a better fellow, going less to the Holly Bush down 
by the Stone-pits, and cleaning himself more regularly of a 
Sunday. 

In front of Sandy Jim stood Chad’s Bess, who had shown 
an unwonted quietude and fixity of attention ever since 
Dinah had begun to speak. Not that the matter of the dis- 
course had arrested her at once, for she was lost in a puz- 
zling speculation as to what pleasure and satisfaction there 
could be in life to a young woman who wore a cap like 
Dinah’s. Giving up this inquiry in despair, she took to 
studying Dinah’s nose, eyes, mouth, and hair, and wonder- 
ing whether it was better to have such a sort of pale face as 
that, or fat red cheeks and round black eyes like her own. 
But gradually the influence of the general gravity told upon 
her, and she became conscious of what Dinah was saying. 
The gentle tones, the loving persuasion, did not touch her; 
but when the more severe appeals came, she began to be 
frightened. Poor Bessy had always been considered a 
naughty girl; she was conscious of it; if it was necessary 

27 


ADAM BEDE 


to be very good, it was clear she must be in a bad way. She 
could n’t find her places at church as Sally Rann could ; she 
had often been tittering when she “ curcheyed ” to Mr. Ir- 
wine ; and these religious deficiencies were accompanied by 
a corresponding slackness in the minor morals, for Bessy 
belonged unquestionably to that unsoaped, lazy class of 
feminine characters with whom you may venture to “ eat an 
egg, an apple, or a nut.” All this she was generally con- 
scious of, and hitherto had not been greatly ashamed of it. 
But now she began to feel very much as if the constable 
had come to take her up and carry her before the justice 
for some undefined offence. She had a terrified sense that 
God, whom she had always thought of as very far off, was 
very near to her, and that Jesus was close by, looking at 
her, though she could not see him. For Dinah had that 
belief in visible manifestations of Jesus which is common 
among the Methodists, and she communicated it irresisti- 
bly to her hearers ; she made them feel that he was among 
them bodily, and might at any mxoment show himself to 
them in some way that would strike anguish and penitence 
into their hearts. 

“ See ! ” she exclaimed, turning to the left, with her eyes 
fixed on a point above the heads of the people, — ‘‘ see 
where our blessed Lord stands and weeps, and stretches out 
his arms towards you. Hear what he says : ‘ How often 

would I have gathered you as a hen gathereth her chickens 
under her wings, and ye would not ! ’ . . . and ye would 
not,” she repeated, in a tone of pleading reproach, turning 
her eyes on the people again. “ See the print of the nails 
on his dear hands and feet. It is your sins that made them ! 
Ah ! how pale and worn he looks ! He has gone through 
all that great agony in the garden, when his soul was ex- 
ceeding sorrowful even unto death, and the great drops of 
sweat fell like blood to the ground. They spat upon him 
and buffeted him, they scourged him, they mocked him, 
they laid the heavy cross on his bruised shoulders. Then 
they nailed him up. Ah ! what pain ! His lips are parched 
with thirst, and they mock him still in this great agony; 
yet with those parched lips he prays for them, ' Father, 
forgive them, for they know not what they do.’ Then a 

28 


THE PREACHING 


horror of great darkness fell upon him, and he felt what 
sinners feel when they are forever shut out from God. That 
was the last drop in the cup of bitterness. ‘ My God, my 
God ! ’ he cries, ‘ why hast Thou forsaken me ? ’ 

“ All this he bore for you ! For you — and you never 
think of him ; for you — and you turn your backs on him ; 
you don’t care what he has gone through for you. Yet he 
is not weary of toiling for you ; he has risen from the dead, 
he is praying for you at the right hand of God, — ‘ Father, 
forgive them, for they know not what they do.’ And he is 
upon this earth too ; he is among us ; he is there close to 
you now ; I see his wounded body and his look of love.” 

Here Dinah turned to Bessy Cranage, whose bonny youth 
and evident vanity had touched her with pity. 

“ Poor child ! poor child ! He is beseeching you, and 
you don’t listen to him. You think of ear-rings and fine 
gowns and caps, and you never think of the Saviour who 
died to save your precious soul. Your cheeks will be shriv- 
elled one day, your hair will be gray, your poor body will 
be thin and tottering! Then you will begin to feel that 
your soul is not saved; then you will have to stand before 
God dressed in your sins, in your evil tempers and vain 
thoughts. And Jesus, who stands ready to help you now, 
won’t help you then ; because you won’t have him to be 
your Saviour, he will be your judge. Now he looks at you 
with love and mercy, and says, ‘ Come to me that you may 
have life ; ’ then he will turn away from you, and say, ‘ De- 
part from me into everlasting fire 1 ’ ” 

Poor Bessy’s wide-open black eyes began to fill with tears, 
her great red cheeks and lips became quite pale, and her 
face was distorted like a little child’s before a burst of cry- 
ing. 

“ Ah ! poor blind child ! ” Dinah went on, “ think if it 
should happen to you as it once happened to a servant of 
God in the days of her vanity. She thought of her lace 
caps, and saved all her money to buy ’em ; she thought 
nothing about how she might get a clean heart and a right 
spirit, she only wanted to have better lace than other girls. 
And one day when she put her new cap on and looked in 
the glass, she saw a bleeding Face crowned with thorns. 

29 


ADAM BEDE 


That face is looking at you now/’ — here Dinah pointed to 
a spot close in front of Bessy. Ah ! tear off those follies ; 
cast them away from you, as if they were stinging adders. 
They are stinging you, — they are poisoning your soul, — 
they are dragging you down into a dark bottomless pit, 
where you will sink forever and forever and forever, farther 
away from light and God.” 

Bessy could bear it no longer; a great terror was upon 
her, and wrenching her ear-rings from her ears, she threw 
them down before her, sobbing aloud. Her father, Chad, 
frightened lest he should be laid hold on ” too, this im- 
pression on the rebellious Bess striking him as nothing 
less than a miracle, walked hastily away, and began to 
work at his anvil by way of reassuring himself. “ Folks 
mun ha’ hoss-shoes, praichin’ or no praichin’ ; the divil 
canna lay hould o’ me for that,” he muttered to himself. 

But now Dinah began to tell of the joys that were in store 
for the penitent, and to describe in her simple way the divine 
peace and love with which the soul of the believer is filled, — 
how the sense of God’s love turns poverty into riches, and 
satisfies the soul, so that no uneasy desire vexes it, no fear 
alarms it ; how, at last, the very temptation to sin is extin- 
guished, and heaven is begun upon earth, because no cloud 
passes between the soul and God, who is its eternal sun. 

Dear friends,” she said at last, ‘‘ brothers and sisters, 
whom I love as those for whom my Lord has died, believe 
me, I know what this great blessedness is; and because I 
know it, I want you to have it too. I am poor, like you; 
I have to get my living with my hands ; but no lord nor 
lady can be so happy as me, if they have n’t got the love of 
God in their souls. Think what it is, — not to hate any- 
thing but sin ; to be full of love to every creature ; to be 
frightened at nothing ; to be sure that all things will turn to 
good ; not to mind pain, because it is our Father’s will ; to 
know that nothing — no, not if the earth was to be burnt 
up, or the waters come and drown us — nothing could part 
us from God, who loves us, and who fills our souls with 
peace and joy, because we are sure that whatever he wills 
is holy, just, and good. 

Dear friends, come and take this blessedness. It is of- 


30 


AFTER THE PREACHING 


fered to you ; it is the good news that Jesus came to preach 
to the poor. It is not like the riches of this world, so that 
the more one gets the less the rest can have. God is with- 
out end ; his love is without end, — 

^ Its streams the whole creation reach, 

So plenteous is the store; 

Enough for all, enough for each, 

Enough forevermore.’ ” 

Dinah had been speaking at least an hour, and the red- 
dening light of the parting day seemed to give a solemn 
emphasis to her closing words. The stranger, who had been 
interested in the course of her sermon, as if it had been the 
development of a drama, — for there is this sort of fascina- 
tion in all sincere unpremeditated eloquence, which opens 
to one the inward drama of the speaker’s emotions, — now 
turned his horse aside, and pursued his way, while Dinah 
said, “ Let us sing a little, dear friends ; ” and as he was still 
winding down the slope, the voices of the Methodists reached 
him, rising and falling in that strange blending of exulta- 
tion and sadness which belongs to the cadence of a hymn. 


CHAPTER HI. 

AFTER THE PREACHING. 

I N less than an hour from that time Seth Bede was walking 
by Dinah’s side along the hedgerow-path that skirted the 
pastures and green cornfields which lay between the village 
and the Hall Farm. Dinah had taken off her little Quaker 
bonnet again, and was holding it in her hands that she might 
have a freer enjoyment of the cool evening twilight ; and Seth 
could see the expression of her face quite clearly as he walked 
by her side, timidly revolving something he wanted to say to 
her. It was an expression of unconscious placid gravity, — 
of absorption in thoughts that had no connection with the 
present moment or with her own personality: an expression 
that is most of all discouraging to a lover. Her very walk 


31 


ADAM BEDE 


was discouraging : it had that quiet elasticity that asks for 
no support. Seth felt this dimly. He said to himself, ‘‘ She ’s 
too good and holy for any man, let alone me ; ” and the words 
he had been summoning rushed back again before they had 
reached his lips. But another thought gave him courage: 
‘‘ There ’s no man could love her better, and leave her freer 
to follow the Lord’s work.” They had been silent for many 
minutes now, since they had done talking about Bessy Cran- 
age. Dinah seemed almost to have forgotten Seth’s presence ; 
and her pace was becoming so much quicker that the sense of 
their being only a few minutes’ walk from the yard-gates of 
the Hall Farm at last gave Seth courage to speak. 

“ You ’ve quite made up your mind to go back to Snow- 
field o’ Saturday, Dinah ? ” 

“ Yes,” said Dinah, quietly. “ I ’m called there. It was 
borne in upon my mind while I was meditating on Sunday 
night, as Sister Allen, who ’s in a decline, is in need of me. 
I saw her as plain as we see that bit of thin white cloud, lift- 
ing up her poor thin hand and beckoning to me. And this 
morning when I opened the Bible for direction, the first 
words my eyes fell on were, ‘ And after we had seen the vi- 
sion, immediately we endeavoured to go into Macedonia.’ If 
it was n’t for that clear showing of the Lord’s will, I should 
be loath to go; for my heart yearns over my aunt and her 
little ones, and that poor wandering lamb Hetty Sorrel. I ’ve 
been much drawn out in prayer for her of late, and I look on 
it as a token that there may be mercy in store for her.” 

God grant it ! ” said Seth. ‘‘ For I doubt Adam’s heart 
is so set on her, he ’ll never turn to anybody else ; and yet it 
'ud go to my heart if he was to marry her, for I canna think 
as she’d make him happy. It’s a deep mystery, — the way 
the heart of man turns to one woman out of all the rest he ’s 
seen i’ the world, and makes it easier for him to work seven 
year for her, like Jacob did for Rachel, sooner than have 
any other woman for th’ asking. I often think of them 
words, ‘ And Jacob served seven years for Rachel ; and they 
seemed to him but a few days for the love he had to her.’ 
I know those words ’ud come true with me, Dinah, if so be 
you ’d give me hope as I might win you after seven years was 
over. I know you think a husband ’ud be taking up too much 

32 


AFTER THE PREACHING 


o’ your thoughts, because Saint Paul says, ' She that ’s mar- 
ried careth for the things of the world how she may please 
her husband ; ’ and may happen you ’ll think me over-bold 
to speak to you about it again, after what you told me o’ 
your mind last Saturday. But I ’ve been thinking it over 
again by night and by day, and I ’ve prayed not to be blinded 
by my own desires, to think what ’s only good for me must 
be good for you too. And it seems to me there ’s more texts 
for your marrying than ever you can find against it. For 
Saint Paul says as plain as can be in another place, ‘ I will 
that the younger women marry, bear children, guide the 
house, give none occasion to the adversary to speak re- 
proachfully ; ’ and then ‘ two are better than one ; ’ and that 
holds good with marriage as well as with other things. For 
we should be o’ one heart and o’ one mind, Dinah. We both 
serve the same Master, and are striving after the same gifts ; 
and I ’d never be the husband to make a claim on you as 
could interfere with your doing the work God has fitted you 
for. I ’d make a shift, and fend indoor and out, to give you 
more liberty, — more than you can now have, for you ’ve 
got to get your own living now, and I ’m strong enough to 
work for us both.” 

When Seth had once begun to urge his suit, he went on 
earnestly, and almost hurriedly, lest Dinah should speak 
some decisive word before he had poured forth all the argu- 
ments he had prepared. His cheeks became flushed as he 
went on, his mild gray eyes filled with tears, and his voice 
trembled as he spoke the last sentence. They had reached 
one of those very narrow passes between two tall stones 
which performed the office of a stile in Loamshire ; and Di- 
nah paused as she turned towards Seth, and said, in her ten- 
der but calm treble notes, — 

“ Seth Bede, I thank you for your love towards me ; and 
if I could think of any man as more than a Christian brother, 
I think it would be you. But my heart is not free to marry. 
That is good for other women, and it is a great and a blessed 
thing to be a wife and mother ; but ^ as God has distributed 
to every man, as the Lord hath called every man, s6 let him 
walk.’ God has called me to minister to others. — not to 
have any joys or sorrows of my own, but to rejoice with them 


3 


33 


ADAM BEDE 


that do rejoice, and to weep with those that weep. He has 
called me to speak his word, and he has greatly owned my 
work. It could only be on a very clear showing that I could 
leave the brethren and sisters at Snowfield, who are favoured 
with very little of this world’s good ; where the trees are few, 
so that a child might count them, and there ’s very hard liv- 
ing for the poor in the winter. It has been given me to help, 
to comfort, and strengthen the little flock there, and to call 
in many wanderers; and my soul is filled with these things 
from my rising up till my lying down. My life is too short, 
and God’s work is too great for me to think of making a 
home for myself in this world. I ’ve not turned a deaf ear 
to your words, Seth ; for when I saw as your love was given 
to me, I thought it might be a leading of Providence for me 
to change my way of life, and that we should be fellow-help- 
ers ; and I spread the matter before the Lord. But whenever 
I tried to fix my mind on marriage, and our living together, 
other thoughts always came in, — the times when I ’ve 
prayed by the sick and dying, and the happy hours I ’ve had 
preaching, when my heart was filled with love, and the Word 
was given to me abundantly. And when I ’ve opened the 
Bible for direction, I ’ve always lighted on some clear word 
to tell me where my work lay. I believe what you say, Seth, 
that you would try to be a help and not a hindrance to my 
work ; but I see that our marriage is not God’s will. He draws 
my heart another way. I desire to live and die without hus- 
band or children. I seem to have no room in my soul for 
wants and fears of my own, it has pleased God to fill my 
heart so full with the wants and sufferings of his poor peo- 
ple.” 

Seth was unable to reply, and they walked on in silence. 
At last, as they were nearly at the yard-gate, he said, — 
Well, Dinah, I must seek for strength to bear it, and to 
endure as seeing Him who is invisible. But I feel now how 
weak my faith is. It seems as if, when you are gone, I could 
never joy in anything any more. I think it ’s something 
passing the love of women as I feel for you, for I could be 
content without your marrying me if I could go and live at 
Snowfield and be near you. I trusted as the strong love God 
had given me towards you was a leading for us both ; but it 


34 


AFTER THE PREACHING 


seems it was only meant for my trial. Perhaps I feel more 
for you than I ought to feel for any creature, for I often can’t 
help saying of you what the hymn says, — 

‘ In darkest shades if she appear, 

My downing is begun; 

She is my soul’s bright morning-star, 

And she my rising sun.’ 

That may be wrong, and I am to be taught better. But you 
would n’t be displeased with me if things turned out so as I 
could leave this country and go to live at Snowfield ? ” 

No, Seth ; but I counsel you to wait patiently, and not 
lightly to leave your own country and kindred. Do nothing 
without the Lord’s clear bidding. It ’s a bleak and barren 
country there, not like this land of Goshen you ’ve been used 
to. We must n’t be in a hurry to fix and choose our own lot ; 
we must wait to be guided.” 

“ But you ’d let me write you a letter, Dinah, if there was 
anything I wanted to tell you ? ” 

Yes, sure ; let me know if you ’re in any trouble. You ’ll 
be continually in my prayers.” 

They had now reached the yard-gate, and Seth said, “ I 
won’t go in, Dinah; so farewell.” He paused and hesitated 
after she had given him her hand, and then said, “ There ’s 
no knowing but what you may see things different after a 
while. There may be a new leading.” 

“ Let us leave that, Seth. It ’s good to live only a moment 
at a time, as I ’ve read in one of Mr. Wesley’s books. It 
is n’t for you and me to lay plans ; we ’ve nothing to do but 
to obey and to trust. Farewell.” 

Dinah pressed his hand with rather a sad look in her lov- 
ing eyes, and tlien passed through the gate, while Seth turned 
away to walk lingeringly home. But instead of taking the 
direct road, he chose to turn back along the fields through 
which he and Dinah had, already passed ; and I think his blue 
linen handkerchief was very wet with tears long before he 
had made up his mind that it was time for him to set his face 
steadily homewards. He was but three-and-twenty, and had 
only just learned what it is to love, — to love with that adora- 
tion which a young man gives to a woman whom he feels to 

35 


ADAM BEDE 


be greater and better than himself. Love of this sort is hard- 
ly distinguishable from religious feeling. What deep and 
worthy love is so, whether of woman or child, or art or mu- 
sic? Our caresses, our tender words, our still rapture under 
the influence of autumn sunsets or pillared vistas or calm 
majestic statues or Beethoven symphonies, all bring with 
them the consciousness that they are mere waves and ripples 
in an unfathomable ocean of love and beauty ; our emotion 
in its keenest moment passes from expression into silence; 
our love at its highest flood rushes beyond its object, and 
loses itself in the sense of divine mystery. And this blessed 
gift of venerating love has been given to too many humble 
craftsmen since the world began, for us to feel any surprise 
that it should have existed in the soul of a Methodist carpen- 
ter half a century ago, while there was yet a lingering after- 
glow from the time when Wesley and his fellow- labourer fed 
on the hips and haws of the Cornwall hedges, after exhaust- 
ing limbs and lungs in carrying a divine message to the poor. 

That afterglow has long faded away; and the picture we 
are apt to make of Methodism in our imagination is not an 
amphitheatre of green hills, or the deep shade of broad-leaved 
sycamores, where a crowd of rough men and weary-hearted 
women drank in a faith which was a rudimentary culture 
which linked their thoughts with the past, lifted their imagi- 
nation above the sordid details of their own narrow lives, and 
suffused their souls with the sense of a pitying, loving, infi- 
nite Presence, sweet as summer to the houseless needy. It is 
too possible that to some of my readers Methodism may 
mean nothing more than low-pitched gables up dingy streets, 
sleek grocers, sponging preachers, and hypocritical jargon, 
— elements which are regarded as an exhaustive analysis of 
Methodism in many fashionable quarters. 

That would be a pity ; for I cannot pretend that Seth and 
Dinah were anything else than Methodists, — not indeed of 
that modern type which reads quarterly reviews and attends 
in chapels with pillared porticos, but of a very old-fashioned 
kind. They believed in present miracles, in instantaneous 
conversions, in revelations by dreams and visions ; they drew 
lots, and sought for Divine guidance by opening the Bible at 
hazard; having a literal way of interpreting the Scriptures, 

36 


HOME AND ITS SORROWS 


which is not at all sanctioned by approved commentator, 
and it is impossible for me to represent their diction as cor- 
rect, or their instruction as liberal. Still — if I have read 
religious history aright — faith, hope, and charity have not 
always been found in a direct ratio with a sensibility to the 
three concords; and it is possible, thank Heaven! to have 
very erroneous theories and very sublime feelings. The raw 
bacon which clumsy Molly spares from her own scanty store, 
that she may carry it to her neighbour’s child to stop the 
fits,” may be a piteously inefficacious remedy ; but the gener- 
ous stirring of neighbourly kindness that prompted the deed 
has a beneficent radiation that is not lost. 

Considering these things, we can hardly think Dinah and 
Seth beneath our sympathy, accustomed as we may be to 
weep over the loftier sorrows of heroines in satin boots and 
crinoline, and of heroes riding fiery horses, themselves ridden 
by still more fiery passions. 

Poor Seth! he was never on horseback in his life except 
once, when he was a little lad, and Mr. Jonathan Burge took 
him up behind, telling him to “ hold on tight ; ” and instead 
of bursting out into wild, accusing apostrophes to God and 
destiny, he is resolving, as he now walks homeward under 
the solemn starlight, to repress his sadness, to be less bent on 
having his own will, and to live more for others, as Dinah 
does. 


CHAPTER IV. 

HOME AND ITS SORROWS. 

A GREEN valley with a brook running through it, full 
almost to overflowing with the late rains ; overhung 
by low stooping willows. Across this brook a plank is 
thrown, and over this plank Adam Bede is passing with his 
undoubting step, followed close by Gyp with the basket; 
evidently making his way to the thatched house, with a 
stack of timber by the side of it, about twenty yards up the 
opposite slope. 

The door of the house is open, and an elderly woman is 

37 


ADAM BEDE 


/Oking out; but she is not placidly contemplating the 
evening sunshine ; she has been watching with dim eyes the 
gradually enlarging speck which for the last few minutes she 
has been quite sure is her darling son Adam. Lisbeth Bede 
loves her son with the love of a woman to whom her first- 
born has come late in life. She is an anxious, spare, yet 
vigorous old woman, clean as a snowdrop. Her gray hair 
is turned neatly back under a pure linen cap with a black 
band round it ; her broad chest is covered with a buff neck- 
erchief, and below this you see a sort of short bed-gown 
made of blue-checkered linen, tied round the waist and de- 
scending to the hips, from whence there is a considerable 
length of linsey-woolsey petticoat. For Lisbeth is tall, and 
in other points too there is a strong likeness betw'een her 
and her son Adam. Her dark eyes are somewhat dim now, 

— perhaps from too much crying, — but her broadly 
marked eyebrows are still black, her teeth are sound, and as 
she stands knitting rapidly and unconsciously with her work- 
hardened hands, she has as firmly upright an attitude as 
when she is carrying a pail of water on her head from the 
spring. There is the same type of frame and the same keen 
activity of temperament in mother and son, but it was not 
from her that Adam got his well-filled brow and his ex- 
pression of large-hearted intelligence. 

Family likeness has often a deep sadness in it. Nature, 
that great tragic dramatist, knits us together by bone and 
muscle, and divides us by the subtler web of our brains ; 
blends yearning and repulsion, and ties us by our heart- 
strings to the beings that jar us at every movement. We 
hear a voice with the very cadence of our own uttering the 
thoughts we despise ; we see eyes — ah ! so like our mother’s 

— averted from us in cold alienation ; and our last darling 
child startles us with the air and gestures of the sister we 
parted from, in bitterness long years ago. The father to 
whom we owe our best heritage — the mechanical instinct, 
the keen sensibility to harmony, the unconscious skill of the 
modelling hand — galls us, and puts us to shame by his 
daily errors; the long-lost mother, whose face we begin to 
see in the glass as our own wrinkles come, once fretted our 

38 


HOME AND ITS SORROWS 


young souls with her anxious humours and irrational per- 
sistence. 

It is such a fond, anxious mother’s voice that you hear, 
as Lisbeth says, — 

“Well, my lad, it’s gone seven by th’ clock. Thee ’t 
allays stay till the last child ’s born. Thee wants thy supper, 
I ’ll warrand. Where ’s Seth ? Gone arter some o’ ’s chapel- 
lin’, I reckon ? ” 

“ Ay, ay, Seth ’s at no harm, mother, thee mayst be sure. 
But where ’s father ? ” said Adam quickly, as he entered the 
house and glanced into the room on the left hand, which was 
used as a workshop. “ Has n’t he done the coffin for Tholer? 
There ’s the stuff standing just as I left it this morning.” 

“ Done the coffm ? ” said Lisbeth, following him, and knit- 
ting uninterruptedly, though she looked at her son very 
anxiously. “ Eh, my lad, he went aff to Treddles’on this 
forenoon, an’ ’s niver come back. I doubt he ’s got to th’ 
' Waggin Overthrow’ again.” 

A deep flush of anger passed rapidly over Adam’s face. 
He said nothing, but threw off his jacket, and began to roll 
up his shirt-sleeves again. 

“ What art goin’ to do, Adam ? ” said the mother, with a 
tone and look of alarm. “ Thee wouldstna go to work again, 
wi’out ha’in’ thy bit o’ supper ? ” 

Adam, too angry to speak, walked into the workshop. 
But his mother threw down her knitting, and hurrying after 
him, took hold of his arm, and said, in a tone of plaintive 
remonstrance, — 

“ Nay, my lad, my lad, thee munna go wi’out thy supper; 
there ’s the taters wi’ the gravy in ’em, just as thee lik’st ’em. 
I saved ’em o’ purpose for thee. Come an’ ha’ thy supper, 
come ! ” 

“ Let be ! ” said Adam impetuously, shaking her off, and 
seizing one of the planks that stood against the wall. “ It ’s 
fine talking about having supper when here ’s a coffin prom- 
ised to be ready at Brox’on by seven o’clock to-morrow 
morning, and ought to ha’ been there now, and not a nail 
struck yet. My throat ’s too full to swallow victuals.” 

“ Why, thee canstna get the coffin ready,” said Lisbeth. 


39 


ADAM BEDE 


“ Thee ’t work thvself to death. It ’ud take thee all night to 
do 

“ What signifies how long it takes me ? Is n’t the coffin 
promised ? Can they bury the man without a coffin ? I ’d 
work my right hand oft sooner than deceive people with 
lies i’ that way. It makes me mad to think on ‘t. I shall 
overrun these doings before long. I’ve stood enough of 
em. 

Poor Lisbeth did not hear this threat for the first time, 
and if she had been wise she would have gone away quietly, 
and said nothing for the next hour. But one of the lessons 
a woman most rarely learns is never to talk to an angry or 
a drunken man. Lisbeth sat down on the chopping-bench 
and began to cry, and by the time she had cried enough to 
make her voice very piteous, she burst out into words. 

“ Nay, my lad, my lad, thee wouldstna go away an’ break 
thy mother’s heart, an’ leave thy feyther to ruin. Thee 
wouldstna ha’ ’em carry me to th’ churchyard, an’ thee not 
to follow me. I shanna rest i’' my grave if I donna see thee 
at th’ last ; an’ how ’s they to let thee know as I ’m a-dyin’, 
if thee ’t gone a-workin’ i’ distant parts, an’ Seth belike gone 
arter thee, and thy feyther not able to hold a pen for ’s 
hand shakin’, besides not knowin’ where thee art? Thee 
mun forgie thy feyther, — thee munna be so bitter again’ 
him. He war a good feyther to thee afore he took to th’ 
drink. He ’s a clever workman, an’ taught thee thy trade, 
remember, an’ ’s niver gen me a blow, nor so much as an ill 
word, — no, not even in ’s drink. Thee wouldstna ha’ ’m 
go to the workhus, — thy own feyther, — an’ him as was a 
fine-growed man, an’ handy at everythin’ a’most as thee art 
thysen, five-an’-twenty ’ear ago, when thee wast a baby at 
the breast.” 

Lisbeth’s voice became louder, and choked with sobs, — 
a sort of wail, the most irritating of all sounds where real 
sorrows are to be borne, and real work to be done. Adam 
broke in impatiently : — 

“ Now, mother, don’t cry and talk so. Have n’t I got 
enough to vex me without that? What ’s th’ use o’ telling 
me things as I only think too much on every day? If I 
didna think on ’em, why should I do as I do, for the sake 


40 


HOME AND ITS SORROWS 


o’ keeping things together here? But I hate to be talking 
where it ’s no use ; I like to keep my breath for doing istead 
o’ talking.” 

I know thee dost things as nobody else ’ud do, my lad. 
But thee ’t allays so hard upo’ thy feyther, Adam. Thee 
think’st nothing too much to do for Seth ; thee snapp’st me 
up if iver I find faut wi’ th’ lad. But thee ’t so angered wi’ 
thy feyther, more nor wi’ anybody else.” 

“ That ’s better than speaking soft, and letting things go 
the wrong way, I reckon, is n’t it ? If I was n’t sharp with 
him, he ’d sell every bit o' stuff i’ th’ yard, and spend it on 
drink. I know there ’s a duty to be done by my father, but 
it is n’t my duty to encourage him in running headlong to 
ruin. And what has Seth got to do with it? The lad does 
no harm as I know of. But leave me alone, mother, and 
let me get on with the work.” 

Lisbeth dared not say any more; but she got up and 
called Gyp, thinking to console herself somewhat for Adam’s 
refusal of the supper she had spread out in the loving ex- 
pectation of looking at him while he ate it, by feeding 
Adam’s dog with extra liberality. But Gyp was watching 
his master with wrinkled brow and ears erect, puzzled at 
this unusual course of things ; and though he glanced at Lis- 
beth when she called him, and moved his forepaws uneasily, 
well knowing that she was inviting him to supper, he was in 
a divided state of mind, and remained seated on his 
haunches, again fixing his eyes anxiously on his master. 
Adam noticed Gyp’s mental conflict ; and though his anger 
had made him less tender than usual to his mother, it did 
not prevent him from caring as much as usual for his dog. 
We are apt to be kinder to the brutes that love us than to 
the women that love us. Is it because the brutes are dumb ? 

“ Go, Gyp ! go, lad ! ” Adam said, in a tone of encourag- 
ing command ; and Gyp, apparently satisfied that duty and 
pleasure were one, followed Lisbeth into the house-place. 

But no sooner had he licked up his supper than he went 
back to his master, while Lisbeth sat down alone to cry 
over her knitting. Women who are never bitter and resent- 
ful are often the most querulous; and if Solomon was as 
wise as he is reputed to be, I feel sure that when he com- 


41 


ADAM BEDE 


pared a contentious woman to a continual dropping on a 
very rainy day, he had not a vixen in his eye, — a fury with 
long nails, acrid and selfish. Depend upon it, he meant a 
good creature, who had no joy but in the happiness of the 
loved ones whom she contributed to make uncomfortable, 
putting by all the tidbits for them, and spending nothing on 
herself; such a woman as Lisbeth, for example, — at once 
patient and complaining, self-renouncing and exacting, 
brooding the livelong day over what happened yesterday, 
and what is likely to happen to-morrow, and crying very 
readily both at the good and the evil. But a certain awe 
mingled itself with her idolatrous love of Adam, and when 
he said, “ Leave me alone,” she was always silenced. 

So the hours passed, to the loud ticking of the old day- 
clock and the sound of Adam’s tools. At last he called for 
a light and a draught of water (beer was a thing only to be 
drunk on holidays), and Lisbeth ventured to say as she took 
it in, “ Thy supper stands ready for thee, when thee lik’st.” 

'' Donna thee sit up, mother,” said Adam, in a gentle 

tone. He had worked off his anger now, and whenever he 
wished to be especially kind to his mother, he fell into his 
strongest native accent and dialect, with which at other 
times his speech was less deeply tinged. I ’ll see to father 
when he comes home; maybe he wonna come at all to- 
night. I shall be easier if thee ’t i’ bed.” 

Nay, I ’ll bide till Seth comes. He wonna be long now, 
I reckon.” 

It was then past nine by the clock, which was always in 
advance of the day; and before it had struck ten the latch 

was lifted, and Seth entered. He had heard the sound of 

the tools as he was approaching. 

“ Why, mother,” he said, “ how is it as father ’s working 
so late ? ” 

“ It 's none o’ thy feyther as is a-workin’, — thee might 
know that well anoof if thy head warna full o’ chapellin’, — 
it ’s thy brother as does iverything, for there ’s niver nobody 
else i’ th’ way to do nothin’.” 

Lisbeth was going on ; for she was not at all afraid of 
Seth, and usually poured into his ears all the querulousness 
which was repressed by her awe of Adam. Seth had never 


42 


HOME AND ITS SORROWS 


in his life spoken a harsh word to his mother, and timid peo- 
ple always wreak their peevishness on the gentle. But Seth, 
with an anxious look, had passed into the workshop and 
said, — 

“ Addy, how 's this ? What ! father 's forgot the coffin ? ” 

“ Ay, lad, th' old tale ; but I shall get it done,” said 
Adam, looking up, and casting one of his bright, keen 
glances at his brother. “ Why, what 's the matter with 
thee? Thee ’t in trouble.” 

Seth's eyes were red, and there was a look of deep de- 
pression on his mild face. 

“ Yes, Addy; but it 's what must be borne, and can’t be 
helped. Why, thee ’st never been to the school, then ? ” 

^‘School? No; that screw can wait,” said Adam, ham- 
mering away again. 

“ Let me take my turn now, and do thee go to bed,” said 
Seth. 

“ No, lad, I ’d rather go on, now I ’m in harness. Thee 
’t help me to carry it to Brox’on when it ’s done. I ’ll call 
thee up at sunrise. Go and eat thy supper, and shut the 
door, so as I may n’t near mother’s talk.” 

Seth knew that Adam always meant what he said, and 
was not to be persuaded into meaning anything else. So 
he turned, with rather a heavy heart, into the house-place. 

“ Adam ’s niver touched a bit o’ victual sin’ home he ’s 
come,” said Lisbeth. I reckon thee ’st hed thy supper at 
some o’ thy Methody folks.” 

“ Nay, mother,” said Seth, I ’ve had no supper yet.” 

“ Come, then,” said Lisbeth ; “ but donna thee ate the 
taters, for Adam ’ull happen ate ’em if I leave ’em stannin’. 
He loves a bit o’ taters an’ gravy. But he ’s been so sore an’ 
angered, he would n’t ate ’em, for all I ’d putten ’em by o’ 
purpose for him. An’ he ’s been a-threatenin’ to go away 
again,” she went on, whimpering, “ an’ I ’m fast sure he ’ll 
go some dawnin’ afore I ’m up, an’ niver let me know afore- 
hand, an’ he ’ll niver come back again when once he ’s gone. 
An’ I ’d better niver ha’ had a son, as is like no other body’s 
son for the deftness an’ th’ handiness, an’ so looked on by th’ 
grit folks, an’ tall an’ upright like a poplar-tree, an’ me to 
be parted from him, an’ niver see ’m no more.” 

43 


ADAM BEDE 


“ Come, mother, donna grieve thyself in vain,” said Seth, 
in a soothing voice, Thee ’st not half so good reason to 
think as Adam ’nil go away as to think he ’ll stay with thee. 
He may say such a thing when he ’s in wrath, — and he ’s 
got excuse for being wrathful sometimes, — but his heart ’ud 
never let him go. Think how he ’s stood by us all when it ’s 
been none so easy, — paying his savings to free me from 
going for a soldier, an’ turnin’ his earnin’s into wood for 
father, when he ’s got plenty o’ uses for his money, and many 
a young man like him ’ud ha’ been married and settled be- 
fore now. He ’ll never turn round and knock down his own 
work, and forsake them as it ’s been the labor of his life 
to stand by.” 

“ Donna talk to me about ’s marr’in,” said Lisbeth, crying 
afresh. “ He ’s set ’s heart on that Hetty Sorrel, as ’ull niver 
save a penny, an’ ’ull toss up her head at ’s old mother. An’ 
to think as he might ha’ Mary Burge, an’ be took partners, 
an’ be a big man wi’ workmen under him, like Mester Burge, 
— Dolly ’s told me so o’er and o’er again, — if it warna as 
he ’s set ’s heart on that bit of a wench, as is o’ no more use 
nor the gillyflower on the wall. An’ he so wise at bookin’ 
an’ figurin’, an’ not to know no better nor that ! ” 

But, mother, thee know’st we canna love just where 
other folks ’ud have us. There ’s nobody but God can con- 
trol the heart of man. I could ha’ wished myself as Adam 
could ha’ made another choice, but I would n’t reproach him 
for what he can’t help. And I ’m not sure but what he tries 
to o’ercome it. But it ’s a matter as he does n’t like to be 
spoke to about, and I can only pray to the Lord to bless and 
direct him.” 

‘‘ Ay, thee ’t allays ready enough at prayin’, but I donna 
see as thee gets much wi’ thy prayin’. Thee wotna get 
double earnin’s o’ this side Yule. Th’ Methodies ’ll niver 
"\^make thee half the man thy brother is, for all they ’re a-mak- 
m’ a preacher on thee.” 

“ It ’s partly truth thee speak’st there, mother,” said Seth, 
mildly ; Adam ’s far before me, an’ ’s done more for me 
than I can ever do for him. God distributes talents to every 
man according as he sees good. But thee mustna under- 
vally prayer. Prayer mayna bring money, but it brings us 


44 


HOME AND ITS SORROWS 


what no money can buy, — a power to keep from sin, and 
be content with God’s will, whatever he may please to send. 
If thee wouldst pray to God to help thee, and trust in his 
goodness, thee wouldstna be so uneasy about things.” 

“ Unaisy? I ’m i’ th’ right on ’t to be unaisy. It ’s well 
seen on thee what it is niver to be unaisy. Thee ’t gi’ away 
all thy earnin’s, an’ niver be unaisy as thee ’st nothin’ laid up 
again’ a rainy day. If Adam had been as aisy as thee, he ’d 
niver ha’ had no money to pay for thee. Take no thought 
for the morrow, — take no thought, — that ’s what thee ’t 
allays sayin’ ; an’ what comes on ’t ? Why, as Adam has 
to take thought for thee.” 

“ Those are the words o’ the Bible, mother,” said Seth. 

They don’t mean as we should be idle. They mean we 
should n’t be over-anxious and worreting ourselves about 
what ’ll happen to-morrow, but do our duty, and leave the 
rest to God’s will.” 

Ay, ay, that ’s the way wi’ thee ; thee allays makes a 
peck o’ thy own words out o’ a pint o’ the Bible’s. I donna 
see how thee ’t to know as ‘ take no thought for the mor- 
row ’ means all that. An’ when the Bible ’s such a big book, 
an’ thee canst read all thro’ ’t, an’ ha’ the pick o’ the texes, 
I canna think why thee dostna pick better words as donna 
mean so much more nor they say. Adam doesna pick 
a-that’n ; I can understan’ the tex as he ’s allays a-sayin’, 
' God helps them as helps theirsens.’ ” 

'' Nay, mother,” said Seth, “ that ’s no text o’ the Bible. 
It comes out of a book as Adam picked up at the stall at 
Treddles’on. It was wrote by a knowing man, but over- 
worldly, I doubt. However, that saying ’s partly true ; for 
the Bible tells us we must be workers together with God.” 

‘'Well, how’m I to know? It sounds like a tex. But 
what ’s th’ matter wi’ th’ lad ? Thee ’t hardly atin’ a bit o’ 
supper. Dostna mean to ha’ no more nor that bit o’ oat- 
cake? An’ thee lookst as white as a flick o’ new bacon. 
What ’s th’ matter wi’ thee ? ” 

“ Nothing to mind about, mother ; I ’m not hungry. I ’ll 
just look in at Adam again, and see if he ’ll let me go on with 
the coffln.” 

“ Ha’ a drop o’ warm broth ? ” said Lisbeth, whose 

45 


ADAM BEDE 


motherly feeling now got the better of her nattering ’’ 
habit. I ’ll set two-three sticks a-light in a minute.” 

“ Nay, mother, thank thee ; thee ’t very good,” said Seth, 
gratefully; and encouraged by this touch of tenderness, he 
went on : Let me pray a bit with thee for father, and 

Adam, and all of us, — it ’ll comfort thee, happen, more 
than thee thinkst.” 

Well, I ’ve nothin’ to say again’ it.” 

Lisbeth, though disposed always to take the negative side 
in her conversation with Seth, had a vague sense that there 
was some comfort and safety in the fact of his piety, and 
that it somehow relieved her from the trouble of any spirit- 
ual transactions on her own behalf. 

So the mother and son knelt down together, and Seth 
prayed for the poor wandering father, and for those who 
were sorrowing for him at home. And when he came to the 
petition that Adam might never be called to set up his tent 
in a far country, but that his mother might be cheered and 
comforted by his presence all the days of her pilgrimage, 
Lisbeth’s ready tears flowed again, and she wept aloud. 

When they rose from their knees, Seth went to Adam 
again, and said, “ Wilt only lie down for an hour or two, 
and let me go on the while ? ” 

No, Seth, no. Make mother go to bed, and go thyself.” 

Meantime Lisbeth had dried her eyes, and now followed 
Seth, holding something in her hands. It was the brown- 
and-yellow platter containing the baked potatoes with the 
gravy in them and bits of meat which she had cut and 
mixed among them. Those were dear times, when wheaten 
bread and fresh meat were delicacies to working people. 
She set the dish down rather timidly on the bench by 
Adam’s side, and said, Thee canst pick a bit while thee ’t 
workin’. I ’ll bring thee another drop o’ water.” 

Ay, mother, do,” said Adam, kindly ; “I’m getting 
very thirsty.” 

In half an hour all was quiet ; no sound was to be heard 
in the house but the loud ticking of the old day-clock, and 
the ringing of Adam’s tools. The night was very still. 
When Adam opened the door to look out at twelve o’clock, 

46 


HOME AND ITS SORROWS 


the only motion seemed to be in the glowing, twinkling 
stars ; every blade of grass was asleep. 

Bodily haste and exertion usually leave our thoughts very 
much at the mercy of our feelings and imagination; and 
it was so to-night with Adam. While his muscles were 
working lustily, his mind seemed as passive as a spectator 
at a diorama; scenes of the sad past and probably sad 
future floating before him, and giving place one to the other 
in swift succession. 

He saw how it would be to-morrow morning, when he 
had carried the cofiin to Broxton and was at home again, 
having his breakfast. His father perhaps would come in 
ashamed to meet his son’s glance, — would sit down, look- 
ing older and more tottering than he had done the morn- 
ing before, and hang down his head, examining the floor- 
quarries ; while Lisbeth would ask him how he supposed the 
coffin had been got ready that he had slinked off and left 
undone, — for Lisbeth was always the first to utter the 
word of reproach, although she cried at Adam’s severity 
towards his father. 

“ So it will go on, worsening and worsening,” thought 
Adam ; '' there ’s no slipping up-hill again, and no standing 
still when once you ve begun to slip down.” And then the 
day came back to him when he was a little fellow and used 
to run by his father’s side, proud to be taken out to work, 
and prouder still to hear his father boasting to his fellow- 
workmen how the little chap had an uncommon notion o’ 
carpentering.” What a fine, active fellow his father was 
then! When people asked Adam whose little lad he was, 
he had a sense of distinction as he answered, “ I ’m Thias 
Bede’s lad,” — he was quite sure everybody knew Thias 
Bede : did n’t he make the wonderful pigeon-house at Brox- 
ton parsonage? Those were happy days, especially when 
Seth, who was three years the younger, began to go out 
working too, and Adam began to be a teacher as well as a 
learner. But then came the days of sadness, when Adam 
was some way on in his teens, and Thias began to loiter 
at the public-houses, and Lisbeth began to cry at home, and 
to pour forth her plaints in the hearing of her sons. Adam 
remembered well the night of shame and anguish when he 

47 


ADAM BEDE 


first saw his father quite wild and foolish, shouting a song 
out fitfully among his drunken companions at the “ Wagon 
Overthrown.” He had run away once when he was only 
eighteen, making his escape in the morning twilight with 
a little blue bundle over his shoulder, and his “ mensuration 
book ” in his pocket, and saying to himself very decidedly 
that he could bear the vexations of home no longer, — he 
would go and seek his fortune, setting up his stick at the 
crossways and bending his steps the way it fell. But by the 
time he got to Stoniton, the thought of his mother and Seth, 
left behind to endure everything without him, became too 
importunate, and his resolution failed him. He came back 
the next day; but the misery and terror his mother had 
gone through in those two days had haunted her ever since. 

“ No ! ” Adam said to himself to-night, “ that must never 
happen again. It ’ud make a poor balance when my doings 
are cast up at the last, if my poor old mother stood o’ the 
wrong side. My back ’s broad enough and strong enough ; 
I should be no better than a coward to go away and leave 
the troubles to be borne by them as are n’t half so able. 

‘ They that are strong ought to bear the infirmities of those 
that are weak, and not to please themselves.’ There ’s a 
text wants no candle to show ’t ; it shines by its own light. 
It ’s plain enough you get into the wrong road i’ this life if 
you run after this and that only for the sake o’ making 
things easy and pleasant to yourself. A pig may poke his 
nose into the trough and think o’ nothing outside it ; but if 
you ’ve got a man’s heart and soul in you, you can’t be easy 
a-making your own bed an’ leaving the rest to lie on the 
stones. Nay, nay, I ’ll never slip my neck out o’ the yoke, 
and leave the load to be drawn by the weak uns. Father ’s 
a sore cross to me, an’ ’s likely to be for many a long year 
to come. What then ? I ’ve got th’ health and the limbs 
and the sperrit to bear it.” 

At this moment a smart rap, as if with a willow wand, 
was given at the house door; and Gyp, instead of barking, 
as might have been expected, gave a loud howl. Adam, 
very much startled, went at once to the door and opened it. 
Nothing was there ; all was still, as when he opened it an 
hour before; the leaves were motionless, and the light of 

48 


HOME AND ITS SORROWS 


the stars showed the placid fields on both sides of the brook 
quite empty of visible life. Adam walked round the house, 
and still saw nothing except a rat which darted into the 
woodshed as he passed. He went in again, wondering ; the 
sound was so peculiar that the moment he heard it, it called 
up the image of the willow wand striking the door. He 
could not help a little shudder, as he remembered how often 
his mother had told him of just such a sound coming as a 
sign when some one was dying. Adam was not a man to 
be gratuitously superstitious; but he had the blood of the 
peasant in him as well as of the artisan, and a peasant can 
no more help believing in a traditional superstition than a 
horse can help trembling when he sees a camel. Besides, 
he had that mental combination which is at once humble in 
the region of mystery and keen in the region of knowledge : 
it was the depth of his reverence quite as much as his hard 
common-sense which gave him his disinclination to doc- 
trinal religion ; and he often checked Seth’s argumentative 
spiritualism by saying, “ Eh, it ’s a big mystery ; thee know’st 
but little about it.” And so it happened that Adam was at 
once penetrating and credulous. If a new building had 
fallen down and he had been told that this was a divine 
judgment, he would have said; “ Maybe ; but the bearing o’ 
the roof and walls was n’t right, else it would n’t ha’ come 
down ; ” yet he believed in dreams and prognostics, and 
to his dying day he bated his breath a little when he told 
the story of the stroke with the willow wand. I tell it as 
he told it, not attempting to reduce it to its natural elements ; 
in our eagerness to explain impressions, we often lose our 
hold of the sympathy that comprehends them. 

But he had the best antidote against imaginative dread in 
the necessity for getting on with the coffin ; and for the next 
ten mintites his hammer was ringing so uninterruptedly that 
other sounds, if there were any, might well be overpowered. 
A pause came, however, when he had to take up his ruler; 
and now again came the strange rap, and again Gyp howled, 
Adam was at the door without the loss of a moment ; but 
again all was still, and the starlight showed there was noth- 
ing but the dew-laden grass in front of the cottage. 

Adam for a moment thought uncomfortably about his 


4 


49 


ADAM BEDE 


father; but of late years he had never come home at dark 
hours from Treddleston, and there was every reason for be- 
lieving that he was then sleeping off his drunkenness at the 
“ Wagon Overthrown.” Besides, to Adam, the conception 
of the future was so inseparable from the painful image of 
his father that the fear of any fatal accident to him was ex- 
cluded by the deeply infixed fear of his continual degrada- 
tion. The next thought that occurred to him was one that 
made him slip oft’ his shoes and tread lightly upstairs, to lis- 
ten at the bedroom doors ; but both Seth and his mother were 
breathing regularly. 

Adam came down and set to work again, saying to him- 
self: “I won’t open the door again. It’s no use staring 
about to catch sight of a sound. Maybe there ’s a world 
about us we can’t see, but th' ear ’s quicker than the eye, 
and catches a sound from ’t now and then. Some people 
think they get a sight on ’t too, but they ’re mostly folks 
whose eyes are not much use to ’em at anything else. For 
my part, I think it ’s better to see when your perpendicular ’s 
true than to see a ghost.” 

Such thoughts as these are apt to grow stronger and 
stronger as daylight quenches the candles and the birds begin 
to sing. By the time the red sunlight shone on the brass nails 
that formed the initials on the lid of the coffin, any lingering 
foreboding from the sound of the willow wand was merged 
in satisfaction that the work was done and the promise re- 
deemed. There was no need to call Seth, for he was already 
moving overhead, and presently came downstairs. 

“ Now, lad,” said Adam, as Seth made his appearance, 
the coffin ’s done, and we can take it over to Brox’on, and 
be back again before half after six. I ’ll take a mouthful o* 
oat-cake, and then we ’ll be off.” 

The coffin was soon propped on the tall shoulders of the 
two brothers, and they were making their way, followed close 
by Gyp, out of the little woody ard into the lane at the back 
of the house. It was but about a mile and a half to Broxton 
over the opposite slope, and their road wound very pleasantly 
along lanes and across fields, where the pale woodbines and 
the dog-roses were scenting the hedgerows, and the birds 
were twittering and trilling in the tall leafy boughs of oak 

50 


HOME AND ITS SORROWS 


and elm. It was a strangely mingled picture, — the fresh 
youth of the summer morning, with its Eden-like peace and 
loveliness, the stalwart strength of the two brothers in their 
rusty working-clothes, and the long coffin on their shoulders. 
They paused for the last time before a small farmhouse out- 
side the village of Broxton. By six o’clock the task was done, 
the coffin nailed down, and Adam and Seth were on their 
way home. They chose a shorter way homeward, which 
would take them across the fields and the brook in front of 
the house. Adam had not mentioned to Seth what had hap- 
pened in the night, but he still retained sufficient impression 
from it himself to say, — 

“ Seth, lad, if father is n’t come home by the time we ’ve 
had our breakfast, I think it ’ll be as well for thee to go over 
to Treddles’on and look after him, and thee canst get me the 
brass wire I want. Never mind about losing an hour at thy 
work ; we can make that up. What dost say? ” 

“ I ’m willing,” said Seth. “ But see what clouds have 
gathered since we set out. I ’m thinking we shall have more 
rain. It ’ll be a sore time for th’ haymaking if the meadows 
are flooded again. The brook ’s fine and full now ; another 
day’s rain ’ud cover the plank, and we should have to go 
round by the road.” 

They were coming across the valley now, and had entered 
the pasture through which the brook ran. 

Why, what ’s that sticking against the willow ? ” con- 
tinued Seth, beginning to walk faster. Adam’s heart rose to 
his mouth; the vague anxiety about his father was changed 
into a great dread. He made no answer to Seth, but ran for- 
ward, preceded by Gyp, who began to bark uneasily; and in 
two moments he was at the bridge. 

This was what the omen meant, then ! And the gray- 
haired father, of whom he had thought with a sort of hard- 
ness a few hours ago, as certain to live to be a thorn in his 
side, was perhaps even then struggling with that watery 
death! This was the first thought that flashed through 
Adam’s conscience, before he had time to seize the coat and 
drag out the tall heavy body. Seth was already by his side, 
helping him ; and when they had it on the bank, the two sons 
in the first moments knelt and looked with mute awe at the 


51 


ADAM BEDE 


glazed eyes, forgetting that there was need for action, for- 
getting everything but that their father lay dead before them. 
Adam was the first to speak. 

“ I ’ll run to mother,” he said in a loud whisper. ‘‘ I ’ll be 
back to thee in a minute.” 

Poor Lisbeth was busy preparing her sons’ breakfast, and 
their porridge was already steaming on the fire. Her kitchen 
always looked the pink of cleanliness, but this morning she 
was more than usually bent on making her hearth and break- 
fast-table look comfortable and inviting 

‘‘ The lads ’ull be fine an’ hungry,” she said, half aloud, as 
she stirred the porridge. “ It ’s a good step to Brox’on an’ 
it ’s hungry air o’er the hill, — wi’ that heavy coffin too. Eh ! 
it ’s heavier now, wi’ poor Bob Tholer in ’t. Howiver, I ’ve 
made a drap more porridge nor common this mornin’. The 
feyther ’ull happen come in arter a bit. Not as he ’ll ate much 
porridge. He swallers sixpenn’orth o’ ale, an’ saves a hap’- 
orth o’ porridge, — that ’s his way o’ layin’ by money, as I ’ve 
told him many a time, an’ am likely to tell him again afore 
the day ’s out. Eh ! poor mon, he takes it quiet enough ; 
there ’s no denyin’ that.” 

But now Lisbeth heard the heavy “ thud ” of a running 
footstep on the turf, and running quickly towards the door, 
she saw Adam enter, looking so pale and overwhelmed that 
she screamed aloud and rushed towards him before he had 
time to speak. 

“ Hush, mother,” Adam said rather hoarsely, “ don’t be 
frightened. Father ’s tumbled into the water. Belike we 
may bring him round again. Seth and me are going to carry 
him in. Get a blanket and make it hot at the fire.” 

In reality Adam was convinced that his father was dead, 
but he knew there was no other way of repressing his moth- 
er’s impetuous wailing grief than by occupying her with some 
active task which had hope in it. 

He ran back to Seth, and the two sOns lifted the sad bur- 
den in heartstricken silence. The wide-open glazed eyes 
were gray, like Seth’s, and had once looked with mild pride 
on the boys before whom Thias had lived to hang his head in 
shame. Seth’s chief feeling was awe and distress at this sud- 
den snatching away of his father’s soul; but Adam’s mind 

52 


THE RECTOR 


rushed back over the past in a flood of relenting and pity. 
When death, the great reconciler, has come, it is never our 
tenderness that we repent of, but our severity. 


CHAPTER V. 

THE RECTOR. 

B efore twelve o’clock there had been some heavy 
storms of rain, and the water lay in deep gutters on 
the sides of the gravel-walks in the garden of Broxton Par- 
sonage; the great Provence roses had been cruelly tossed by 
the wind and beaten by the rain, and all the delicate-stemmed 
border flowers had been dashed down and stained with the wet 
soil. A melancholy morning, because it was nearly time 
hay-harvest should begin, and instead of that the meadows 
were likely to be flooded. 

But people who have pleasant homes get indoor enjoy- 
ments that they would never think of but for the rain. If 
it had not been a wet morning, Mr. Irwine would not have 
been in the dining-room playing at chess with his mother, and 
he loves both his mother and chess quite well enough to pass 
some cloudy hours very easily by their help. Let me take 
you into that dining-room, and show you the Rev. Adolphus 
Irwine, Rector of Broxton, Vicar of Hayslope, and Vicar of 
Blythe, a pluralist at whom the severest Church reformer 
would have found it difficult to look sour. We will enter 
very softly, and stand still in the open doorway, without 
awaking the glossy-brown setter who is stretched across the 
hearth, with her two puppies beside her; or the pug who is 
dozing, with his black muzzle aloft, like a sleepy president. 

The room is a large and lofty one, with an ample mul- 
lioned oriel window at one end; the walls, you see, are new 
and not yet painted; but the furniture, though originally of 
an expensive sort, is old and scanty, and there is no drapery 
about the window. The crimson cloth over the large dining - 
table is very threadbare, though it contrasts pleasantly 
enough with the dead hue of the plaster on the walls ; but on 
this cloth there is a massive silver waiter with a decanter of 


53 


ADAM BEDE 


water on it, of the same pattern as two larger ones that are 
propped up on the sideboard with a coat of arms conspicuous 
in their centre. You suspect at once that the inhabitants of 
this room have inherited more blood than wealth, and would 
not be surprised to find that Mr. Irwine had a finely cut nos- 
tril and upper lip ; but at present we can only see that he has 
a broad flat back and an abundance of powdered hair, all 
thrown backward and tied behind with a black ribbon, — a 
bit of conservatism in costume which tells you that he is 
not a young man. He will perhaps turn round by and by, 
and in the mean time we can look at that stately old lady, 
his mother, — a beautiful aged brunette, whose rich-toned 
complexion is well set off by the complex wrappings of pure 
white cambric and lace about her head and neck. She is as 
erect in her comely embonpoint as a statue of Ceres ; and her 
dark face, with its delicate aquiline nose, firm proud mouth, 
and small intense black eye, is so keen and sarcastic in its 
expression that you instinctively substitute a pack of cards 
for the chess-men, and imagine her telling your fortune. The 
small brown hand with which she is lifting her queen is laden 
with pearls, diamonds, and turquoises ; and a large black veil 
is very carefully adjusted over the crown of her cap, and falls 
in sharp contrast on the white folds about her neck. It must 
take a long time to dress that old lady in the morning ! But 
it seems a law of nature that she should be dressed so ; she is 
clearly one of those children of royalty who have never 
doubted their right divine, and never met with any one so 
absurd as to question it. 

‘‘ There, Dauphin, tell me what that is ! ” says this magnifi- 
cent old lady, as she deposits her queen very quietly and folds 
her arms. “ I should be sorry to utter a word disagreeable 
to your feelings.’^ 

“ Ah ! you witch-mother, you sorceress ! How is a Chris- 
tian man to win a game off you? I should have sprinkled 
the board with holy water before we began. You Ve not 
won that game by fair means, now, so don’t pretend it.” 

‘"Yes, yes, that’s what the beaten have always said of 
great conquerors. But see, there ’s the sunshine falling on 
the board, to show you more clearly what a foolish move you 

54 


THE RECTOR 


made with that pawn. Come, shall I give you another 
chance? ” 

“ No, mother, I shall leave you to your own conscience, 
now it ’s clearing up. We must go and plash up the mud a 
little, must n’t we, Juno? ” This was addressed to the brown 
setter, who had jumped up at the sound of the voices and 
laid her nose in an insinuating way on her master’s leg. 
“ But I must go upstairs first and see Anne. I was called 
away to Tholer’s funeral just when I was going before.” 

“ It ’s of no use, child ; she can’t speak to you. Kate says 
she has one of her worst headaches this morning.” 

Oh, she likes me to go and see her just the same ; she ’s 
never too ill to care about that.” 

If you know how much of human speech is mere purpose- 
less impulse or habit, you will not wonder when I tell you 
that this identical objection had been made, and had received 
the same kind of answer, many hundred times in the course of 
the fifteen years that Mr. Irwine’s sister Anne had been an in- 
valid. Splendid old ladies, who take a long time to dress in 
the morning, have often slight sympathy with sickly 
daughters. 

But while Mr. Irwine was still seated, leaning back in his 
chair and stroking Juno’s head, the servant came to the door 
and said, “ If you please, sir, Joshua Rann wishes to speak 
wdth you, if you are at liberty.” 

'' Let him be shown in here,” said Mrs. Irwine, taking up 
her knitting. “ I always like to hear what Mr. Rann has 
got to say. His shoes will be dirty, but see that he wipes 
them, Carroll.” 

In two minutes Mr. Rann appeared at the door with very 
deferential bows, which however were far from conciliating 
Pug, who gave a sharp bark, and ran across the room to re- 
connoitre the stranger’s legs ; while the two puppies regard- 
ing Mr. Rann’s prominent calf and ribbed worsted stockings 
from a more sensuous point of view, plunged and growled 
over them in great enjoyment. Meantime Mr. Irwine turned 
round his chair and said, — 

“ Well, Joshua, anything the matter at Hayslope, that 
you Ve come over this damp morning? Sit down, sit down. 

55 


ADAM BEDE 


Never mind the dogs ; give them a friendly kick. Here, Pug, 
you rascal ! ” 

I't is very pleasant to see some men turn round; pleasant 
as a sudden rush of warm air in winter, or the flash of fire- 
light in the chill dusk. Mr. Irwine was one of those men. 
He bore the same sort of resemblance to his mother that our 
loving memory of a friend’s face often bears to the face itself ; 
the lines were all more generous, the smile brighter, the ex- 
pression heartier. If the outline had been less finely cut, his 
face might have been called jolly; but that was not the right 
word for its mixture of bonhomie and distinction. 

“ Thank your reverence,” answered Mr. Rann, endeavour- 
ing to look unconcerned about his legs, but shaking them 
alternately to keep off the puppies ; ‘‘ I ’ll stand, if you please,, 
as more becoming. I hope I see you an’ Mrs. Irwine well, 
an’ Miss Irwine — an’ Miss Anne I hope ’s as well as usual.” 

Yes, Joshua, thank you. You see how blooming my 
mother looks. She beats us younger people hollow. But 
what ’s the matter? ” 

“ Why, sir, I had to come to Brox’on to deliver some work, 
and I thought it but right to call and let you know the goin’s- 
\ on as there ’s been i’ the village, such as I hanna seen i’ my 
time, and I ’ve lived in it man and boy sixty year come St. 
Thomas, and collected th’ Easter dues for Mr. Blick before 
your reverence come into the parish, and been at the ringin’ 
o’ every bell, and the diggin’ o’ every grave, and sung i’ 
the quire long afore Bartle Massey come from nobody 
knows where, wi’ his counter-singin’ and fine anthems, as 
puts everybody out but himself, — one takin’ it up after an- 
other like sheep a-bleatin’ i’ th’ fold. I know what belongs 
to bein’ a parish clerk,, and I know as I should be wantin’ i* 
respect to your reverence, an’ church an’ king, if I was t’ 
allow such goin’s-on wi’out speakin’. I was took by surprise, 
an’ knowed nothin’ on it beforehand ; an’ I was so flustered, 
I was clean as if I ’d lost my tools. I hanna slep’ more nor 
four hours this night as is past an’ gone; an’ then it was 
nothin’ but nightmare, as tired me worse nor walkin’.” 

‘'Why, what in the world is the matter, Joshua? Have 
the thieves been at the church lead again ? ” 

“ Thieves ! no, sir, — an’ yet, as I may say, it is thieves, an’ 

56 


THE RECTOR 


a-thievin’ the church too. It ’s the Methodisses as is like to 
get th’ upper hand i’ th’ parish, if your reverence an’ his 
honor, Squire Donnithorne, doesna think well to say the 
word an’ forbid it. Not as I ’m a-dictatin’ to you, sir ; I ’m 
not forgettin’ myself so far as to be wise above my betters. 
Howiver, whether I ’m wise or no, that ’s neither here nor 
there, but what I ’ve got to say I say, — as the young Metho- 
dis woman as is at Mester Poyser’s was a-preachin’ an’ 
a-prayin’ on the Green last night, as sure as I ’m a-stannin’ 
afore your reverence now.” 

Preaching on the Green ! ” said Mr. Irwine, looking sur^ 
prised but quite serene, “ What ! that pale pretty young 
woman I ’ve seen at Poyser’s ? I saw she was a Methodist 
or Quaker, or something of that sort, by her dress, but I 
did n’t know she was a preacher.” 

“ It ’s a true word as I say, sir,” rejoined Mr. Rann, com- 
pressing his mouth into a semicircular form, and pausing 
long enough to indicate three notes of exclamation. “ She 
preached on the Green last night ; an’ she ’s laid hold of 
Chad’s Bess, as the girl ’s been i’ fits welly iver sin’.” 

Well, Bessy Cranage is a hearty-looking lass ; I dare say 
she ’ll come round again, Joshua. Did anybody else go into 
fits?” 

“ No, sir, I canna say as they did. But there ’s no knowin’ 
what ’ll come, if we ’re t’ have such preachin’s as that a-goin’ 
on ivery week — there ’ll be no livin’ i’ th’ village. For them 
Methodisses make folks believe as if they take a mug o’ drink 
extry an’ make theirselves a bit comfortable, they ’ll have to 
go to hell for ’t as sure as they ’re born. I ’m not a tipplin’ 
man nor a drunkard, — nobody can say it on me, — but I 
like a extry quart at Easter or Christmas time, as is nat’ral 
when we ’re goin’ the rounds a-singin’ an’ folks offer ’t you 
for nothin’, or when I ’m a-collectin’ the dues ; an’ I like a 
pint wi’ my pipe, an’ a neighbourly chat at Mester Casson’s 
now an’ then, for I was brought up i’ the Church, thank God, 
an’ ha’ been a parish clerk this two-an’-thirty year: I should 
know what the church religion is.” 

Well, what ’s your advice, Joshua ? What do you think 
should be done ? ” 

“ Well, your reverence, I ’m not for takin’ any measures 

57 


ADAM BEDE 


again’ the young woman. She ’s well enough if she ’d let 
alone preachin’ ; an’ I hear as she ’s a-goin away back to her 
own country soon. She ’s Mr. Poyser’s own niece, an’ I 
donna wish to say what ’s anyways disrespectful o’ th’ fam- 
ily at th’ Hall Farm, as I ’ve measured for shoes, little an’ 
big, welly iver sin’ I ’ve been a shoemaker. But there ’s that 
Will Maskery, sir, as is the rampageousest Methodis as can 
be, an’ I make no doubt it was him as stirred up th’ young 
woman to preach last night, an’ he ’ll be a-bringin’ other 
folks to preach from Treddles’on, if his comb is n’t cut a bit ; 
an’ I think as he should be let know as he isna t’ have the 
makin’ an’ mendin’ o’ church carts an’ implemen’s, let alone 
stayin’ i’ that house an’ yard as is Squire Donnithorne’s.” 

Well, but you say yourself, Joshua, that you never knew 
any one come to preach on the Green before ; why should you 
think they ’ll come again ? The Methodists don’t come to 
preach in little villages like Hayslope, where there ’s only a 
handful of labourers, too tired to listen to them. They might 
almost as well go and preach on the Binton Hills. Will 
Maskery is no preacher himself, I think.” 

‘‘ Nay, sir, he ’s no gift at stringin’ the words together 
wi’out book ; he ’d be stuck fast like a cow i’ wet clay. But 
he ’s got tongue enough to speak disrespectful about ’s nee- 
bours, for he said as I was a blind Pharisee, — a-usin’ the 
Bible i' that way to find nicknames for folks as are his elders 
an’ betters ! — and what ’s worse, he ’s been heard to say very 
unbecomin’ words about your reverence; for I could bring 
them as ’ud swear as he called you a ‘ dumb dog,’ an’ a ‘ idle 
shepherd.’ You’ll forgi’e me for sayin’ such things over 
again.” 

“ Better not, better not, Joshua. Let evil words die as soon 
as they ’re spoken. Will Maskery might be a great deal worse 
fellow than he is. He used to be a wild drunken rascal, neg- 
lecting his work and beating his wife, they told me ; now he ’s 
thrifty and decent, and he and his wife look comfortable to- 
gether. If you can bring me any proof that he interferes with 
his neighbours and creates any disturbance, I shall think it 
my duty as a clergyman and a magistrate to interfere. But 
it would n’t become wise people, like you and me, to be mak- 
ing a fuss about trifles, as if we thought the Church was in 

58 


THE RECTOR 


dangc-y because Will Maskery lets his tongue wag rather fool- 
ishly, or a young woman talks in a serious way to a handful 
of people on the Green. We must ‘ live and let live,’ Joshua, 
in religion as well as in other things. You go on doing your 
duty as parish clerk and sexton as well as you Ve always done 
it, and making those capital thick boots for your neighbours, 
and things won’t go far wrong in Hayslope, depend upon it.” 

‘‘ Your reverence is very good to say so; an’ I ’m sensable 
as, you not livin’ i’ the parish, there ’s more upo’ my shoul- 
ders.” 

“ To be sure ; and you must mind and not lower the Church 
in people’s eyes by seeming to be frightened about it for a little 
thing, Joshua. I shall trust to your good sense, now, to take 
no notice at all of what Will Maskery says, either about you 
or me. You and your neighbours can go on taking your pot 
of beer soberly, when you ’ve done your day’s work, like good 
churchmen ; and if Will Maskery does n’t like to join you, but 
to go to a prayer-meeting at Treddleston instead, let him ; 
that ’s no business of yours, so long as he does n’t hinder you 
from doing what yoii like. And as to people saying a few idle 
words about us, we must not mind that, any more than the old 
church-steeple minds the rooks cawing about it. Will Mask- 
ery comes ‘to church every Sunday afternoon, and does his 
wheelwright’s business steadily in the week-days ; and as long 
as he does that he must be let alone.” 

“ Ah, sir, but when he comes to church, he sits an’ shakes 
his head, an’ looks as sour an’ as coxy when we ’re a-singin’ as 
I should like to fetch him a rap across the jowl — God forgi’e 
me — an’ Mrs. Irwine, an’ your reverence, too, for speakin’ 
so afore you. An’ he said as our Christmas singin’ was no 
better nor the cracklin’ o’ thorns under the pot.” 

Well, he ’s got a bad ear for music, Joshua. When people 
have wooden heads, you know, it can’t be helped. He won’t 
bring the other people in Hayslope round to his opinion while 
you go on singing as well as you do.” 

Y’es, sir, but it turns a man’s stomach t’ hear the Scripture 
misused i’ that way. I know as much o’ the words o’ the 
Bible as he does, an’ could say the Psalms right through i’ my 
sleep if you was to pinch me; but I know better nor to take 

59 


ADAM BEDE 


’em to wSay my own say wi’. I might as well take the 3acri- 
ment-cup home and use it at meals.” 

“ That's a very sensible remark of yours, Joshua ; but, as 
I said before — ” 

While Mr. Irwine was speaking, the sound of a booted step 
and the clink of a spur were heard on the stone floor of the 
entrance-hall, and Joshua Rann moved hastily aside from the 
doorway to make room for some one who paused there and 
said in a ringing tenor voice, — 

“ Godson Arthur ; may he come in ? ” 

Come in, come in, godson ! ” Mrs. Irwine answered, in the 
deep half-masculine tone which belongs to the vigorous old 
woman, and there entered a young gentleman in a riding- 
dress, with his right arm in a sling ; whereupon followed that 
pleasant confusion of laughing interjections, and hand-shak- 
ings, and ‘‘ How are you’s r ” mingled with joyous short barks 
and wagging of tails on the part of the canine members of the 
family, which tells that the visitor is on the best terms with 
the visited. The young gentleman was Arthur Donnithorne, 
known in Hayslope, variously, as “ the young squire,” “ the 
heir,” and “ the captain.” He was only a captain in the Loam- 
shire Militia; but to the Hayslope tenants he was more in- 
tensely a captain than all the young gentlemen of the same 
rank in his Majesty’s regulars, — he outshone them as the 
planet Jupiter outshines the Milky Way. If you want to 
know more particularly how he looked, call to your remem- 
brance some tawny-whiskered, brown-locked, clear-complex- 
ioned young Englishman whom you have met with in a for- 
eign town, and been proud of as a fellow-countryman, — well- 
washed, high-bred, white-handed, yet looking as if he could 
deliver well from the left shoulder, and floor his man. I will 
not be so much of a tailor as to trouble your imagination with 
the diflerence of costume, and insist on the striped waistcoat, 
long-tailed coat, and low top-boots. 

Turning round to take a chair, Captain Donnithorne said. 
But don't let me interrupt Joshua’s business, — he has some- 
thing to say.” 

“ Humbly begging your honor’s pardon,” said Joshua, bow- 
ing low, “ there was one thing I had to say to his reverence as 
other things had drove out o’ my head.” 

6o 


THE RECTOR 


Gut with it, Joshua, quickly ! ’’ said Mr. Irwine. 

‘‘ Belike, sir, you havena beared as Thias Bede 's dead, — 
drownded this morning, or more like over-night, i’ the Willow 
Brook again’ the bridge right i’ front o’ the house.” 

Ah ! ” exclaimed both the gentlemen at once, as if they 
were a good deal interested in the information. 

An’ Seth Bede’s been to me this morning to say he wished 
me to tell your reverence as his brother Adam begged of you 
particular t’ allow his father’s grave to be dug by the White 
Thorn, because his mother’s set her heart on it, on account 
of a dream as she had ; an’ they ’d ha’ come theirselves to ask 
you, but they ’ve so much to see after with the crowner, an’ 
that ; an’ their mother ’s took on so, an’ wants ’em to make 
sure o’ the spot for fear somebody else should take it. An’ if 
your reverence sees well and good, I ’ll send my boy to tell ’em 
as soon as I get home ; an’ that ’s why I make bold to trouble 
you wi’ it, his honor being present.” 

/^To be sure, Joshua, to be sure, they shall have it. I ’ll 
ride round to Adam myself, and see him. Send your boy, 
however, to say they shall have the grave, lest anything should 
happen to detain me. And now, good morning, Joshua; go 
into the kitchen and have some ale.” 

Poor old Thias ! ” said Mr. Irwine, when Joshua was 
gone. '‘I’m afraid the drink helped the brook to drowm him. 
I should have been glad for the load to have been taken off my 
friend Adam’s shoulders in a less painful way. That fine fel- 
low has been propping up his father from ruin for the last five 
or six years.” 

''He’s a regular trump, is Adam,” said Captain Donnithorne. 
" When I w^as a little fellow, and Adam was a strapping lad 
of fifteen and taught me carpentering, I used to think if ever 
I was a rich sultan, I would make Adam my grand-vizier. 
And I believe now, he would bear the exaltation as well as any 
poor wise man in an Eastern story. If ever I live to be a 
large-acred man instead of a poor devil with a mortgaged al- 
lov/ance of pocket-money, I ’ll have Adam for my right hand. 
He shall manage my woods for me, for he seems to have a 
better notion of those things than any man I ever met with ; 
and I know he would make twice the money of them that my 
grandfather does, with that miserable old Satchell to manage, 

6i 


ADAM BEDE 


who understands no more about timber than an old carp. I ’ve 
mentioned the subject to my grandfather once or twice; but 
for some reason or other he has a dislike to Adam, and I can 
do nothing. But come, your reverence, are you for a ride 
with me? It’s splendid out of doors now. We can go to 
Adam’s together, if you like; but I want to call at the Hall 
Farm on my way, to look at the whelps Poyser is keeping for 
me.” 

You must stay and have lunch first, Arthur,” said Mrs. 
Irwine. It ’s nearly two. Carroll will bring it in directly.” 

“ I want to go to the Hall Farm too,” said Mr. Irwine, “ to 
have another look at the little Methodist who is staying there. 
Joshua tells me she was preaching on the Green last night.” 

“ Oh, by Jove ! ” said Captain Donnithorne, laughing. 

Why, she looks as quiet as a mouse. There ’s something 
rather striking about her, though. I positively felt quite bash- 
ful the first time I saw her. She was sitting stooping over her 
sewing in the sunshine outside the house, when I rode up and 
called out, without noticing that she was a stranger, ‘ Is Mar- 
tin Poyser at home ? ’ I declare, when she got up and looked 
at me, and just said, ‘ He’s in the house, I believe; I ’ll go 
and call him,’ I felt quite ashamed of having spoken so abrupt- 
ly to her. She looked like Saint Catherine in a Quaker dress. 
It ’s a type of face one rarely sees among our common peo- 
ple.” 

‘‘ I should like to see the young woman, Dauphin,” said 
Mrs. Irwine. ‘‘ Make her come here on some pretext or 
other.” 

“ I don’t know how I can manage that, mother ; it will 
hardly do for me to patronize a Methodist preacher, even if 
she would consent to be patronized by an idle shepherd, as 
Will Maskery calls me. You should have come in a little 
sooner, Arthur, to hear Joshua’s denunciation of his neigh- 
bour Will Maskery. The old fellow wants me to excommuni- 
cate the wheelright, and then deliver him over to the civil arm 
— that is to say, to your grandfather — to be turned out of 
house and yard. If I chose to interfere in this business, now, 
I might get up as pretty a story of hatred and persecution as 
the Methodists need desire to publish in the next number of 
their magazine. It wouldn’t take me much trouble to per- 

62 


THE RECTOR 


suade Chad Cranage and half-a-dozen other bull-headed fel- 
lows, that they would be doing an acceptable service to the 
Church by hunting Will Maskery out of the village with rope- 
ends and pitchforks; and then, when I had furnished them 
with half a sovereign to get gloriously drunk after their exer- 
tions, I should have put the climax to as pretty a farce as any 
of my brother clergy have set going in their parishes for the 
last thirty years.” 

“ It is really insolent of the man, though, to call you an 
‘ idle shepherd ’ and a ‘dumb dog,' ” said Mrs. Irwine. “ I 
should be inclined to check him a little there. You are too 
easy-tempered, Dauphin.” 

“ Why, mother, you don't think it would be a good way of 
sustaining my dignity to set about vindicating myself from the 
aspersions of Will Maskery? Besides, I 'm not so sure that 
they are aspersions. I am a lazy fellow, and get terribly heavy 
in my saddle ; not to mention that I 'm always spending more 
than I can afford in bricks and mortar, so that I get savage at 
a lame beggar when he asks me for sixpence. Those poor 
lean cobblers, who think they can help to regenerate mankind 
by setting out to preach in the morning twilight before they 
begin their day's work, may well have a poor opinion of me. 
But come, let us have our luncheon. Isn’t Kate coming to 
lunch?” 

“ Miss Irwine told Bridget to take her lunch upstairs,” said 
Carroll ; she can’t leave Miss Anne.” 

“ Oh, very well. Tell Bridget to say I '11 go up and see 
Miss Anne presently. You can use your right arm quite well 
now, Arthur,” Mr. Irwine continued, observing that Captain 
Donnithorne had taken his arm out of the sling. 

“ Yes, pretty well; but Godwin insists on my keeping it up 
constantly for some time to come. I hope I shall be able to 
get away to the regiment, though, in the beginning of August. 
It ’s a desperately dull business being shut up at the Chase in 
the summer months, when one can neither hunt nor shoot, so 
as to make one’s self pleasantly sleepy in the evening. How- 
ever, we are to astonish the echoes on the 30th of July. My 
grandfather has given me carte blanche for once, and I prom- 
ise you the entertainment shall be worthy of the occasion. 
The world will not see the grand epoch of my majority twice. 

63 


ADAM BEDE 


I think I shall have a lofty throne for you, godmamma, or 
rather two, one on the lawn and another in the ball-room, that 
you may sit and look down upon us like an Olympian god- 
dess.” 

‘‘ I mean to bring out my best brocade, that I wore at your 
christening twenty years ago,” said Mrs. Irwine. “ Ah, I 
think I shall see your poor mother flitting about in her white 
dress, which looked to me almost like a shroud that very day ; 
and it was her shroud only three months after; and your little 
cap and christening dress were buried with her too. She had 
set her heart on that, sweet soul ! Thank God 3^ou take after 
your mother's family, Arthur. If you had been a puny, wiry, 
yellow baby, I would n’t have stood godmother to you. I 
should have been sure you would turn out a Donnithorne. 
But you were such a broad- faced, broad-chested, loud-scream- 
ing rascal, I knew you were every inch of you a Tradgett.” 

“ But you might have been a little too hasty there, mother,” 
said Mr. Irwine, smiling. “ Don’t you remember how it was 
with Juno’s last pups? One of them was the very image of 
its mother, but it had two or three of its father’s tricks not- 
withstanding. Nature is clever enough to cheat even you, 
mother.” 

“ Nonsense, child ! Nature never makes a ferret in the 
shape of a mastiff. You ’ll never persuade me that I can’t tell 
what men are by their outsides. If I don’t like a man’s looks, 
depend upon it I shall never like him. I don’t want to know 
people that look ugly and disagreeable, any more than I want 
to taste dishes that look disagreeable. If they make me shud- 
der at the first glance, I say, take them away. An ugly, pig- 
gish, or fishy eye, now, makes me feel quite ill ; it ’s like a bad 
smell.” 

“ Talking of eyes,” said Captain Donnithorne, “ that re- 
minds me that I ’ve got a book I meant to bring you, godmam- 
ma. It came down in a parcel from London the other day. 
I know you are fond of queer, wizard-like stories. It ’s a 
volume of poems, ‘ Lyrical Ballads.’ Most of them seem to 
be twaddling stuff ; but the first is in a different style, — ‘ The 
Ancient Mariner ’ is the title. I can hardly make head or tail 
of it as a story, but it ’s a strange, striking thing. I ’ll send 
it over to you ; and there are some other books that you may 

64 


THE RECTOR 


like to see, Irwine, — pamphlets about Antinomianism and 
Evangelicalism, whatever they may be. I can’t think what 
the fellow means by sending such things to me. I ’ve written 
to him to desire that from henceforth he will send me no book 
or pamphlet on anything that ends in ism/' 

“ Well, I don’t know that I ’m very fond of isms myself; 
but 1 may as well look at the pamphlets ; they let one see what 
is going on. I ’ve a little matter to attend to, Arthur,” con- 
tinued Mr. Irwine, rising to leave the room, “ and then I shall 
be ready to set out with you.” 

The little matter that Mr. Irwine had to attend to took him 
up the old stone staircase (part of the house was very old), 
and made him pause before a door at which he knocked gently. 

Come in,” said a woman’s voice ; and he entered a room 
so darkened by blinds and curtains that Miss Kate, the thin 
middle-aged lady standing by the bedside, would not have had 
light enough for any other sort of work than the knitting 
which lay on the little table near her. But at present she was 
doing what required only the dimmest light, — sponging the 
aching head that lay on the pillow with fresh vinegar. It was 
a small face, that of the poor sufferer; perhaps it had once 
been pretty, but now it was worn and sallow. Miss Kate came 
towards her brother and whispered, “ Don’t speak to her ; she 
can’t bear to be spoken to to-day.” Anne’s eyes were closed, 
and her brow contracted as if from intense pain. Mr. Irwine 
went to the bedside, and took up one of the delicate hands and 
kissed it; a slight pressure from the small fingers told him 
that it was worth while to have come upstairs for the sake of 
doing that. He lingered a moment, looking at her, and then 
turned away and left the room, treading very gently, — he 
had taken off his boots and put on slippers before he came 
upstairs. Whoever remembers how many things he has de- 
clined to do even for himself, rather than have the trouble of 
putting on or taking off his boots, will not think this last detail 
insignificant. 

And Mr. Irwine’s sisters, as any person of family within 
ten miles of Broxton could have testified, were such stupid, 
uninteresting women ! It was quite a pity handsome, clever 
Mrs. Irwine should have had such commonplace daughters. 
That fine old lady herself was worth driving ten miles to see, 

6s 


5 


ADAM BEDE 


any day ; her beauty, her well-preserved faculties, and her old- 
fashioned dignity made her a graceful subject for conversa- 
tion in turn with the King’s health, the sweet new patterns in 
cotton dresses, the news from Egypt, and Lord Dacey’s law- 
suit, which was fretting poor Lady Dacey to death. But no 
one ever thought of mentioning the Miss Irwines, except the 
poor people in Broxton village, who regarded them as deep 
in the science of medicine, and spoke of them vaguely as “ the 
gentlefolks.” If any one had asked old Job Dummilow who 
gave him his flannel jacket, he would have answered, “ The 
gentlefolks, last winter;” and widow Steene dwelt much on 
the virtues of the “ stuff ” the gentlefolks gave her for her 
cough. Under this name, too, they were used with great 
effect as a means of taming refractory children, so that at the 
sight of poor Miss Anne’s sallow face, several small urchins 
had a terrified sense that she was cognizant of all their worst 
misdemeanours, and knew the precise number of stones with 
which they had intended to hit farmer Britton’s ducks. But 
for all who saw them through a less mythical medium, the 
Miss Irwines were quite superfluous existences; inartistic 
figures crowding the canvas of life without adequate effect. 
Miss Anne, indeed, if her chronic headaches could have been 
accounted for by a pathetic story of disappointed love, might 
have had some romantic interest attached to her ; but no such 
story had either been known or invented concerning her, and 
the general impression was quite in accordance with the fact 
that both the sisters were old maids for the prosaic reason that 
they had never received an eligible offer. 

Nevertheless, to speak paradoxically, the existence of in- 
significant people has very important consequences in the 
world. It can be shown to affect the price of bread and the 
rate of wages, to call forth many evil tempers from the selfish, 
and many heroisms from the sympathetic, and, in other ways, 
to play no small part in the tragedy of life. And if that hand- 
some, generous-blooded clergyman, the Rev. Adolphus Irwine, 
had not had these two hopelessly maiden sisters, his lot would 
have been shaped quite differently : he would very likely have 
taken a comely wife in his youth, and now, when his hair was 
getting gray under the powder, would have had tall sons and 
blooming daughters, — such possessions,' in short, as men 

66 


THE RECTOR 


commonly think will repay them for all the labour they take 
under the sun. As it was, — having with all his three livings 
no more than seven hundred a year, and seeing no way of 
keeping his splendid mother and his sickly sister, not to reckon 
a second sister, who was usually spoken of without any ad- 
jective, in such ladylike ease as became their birth and habits, 
and at the same time providing for a family of his own, — he 
remained, you see, at the age of eight-and- forty, a bachelor, 
not making any merit of that renunciation, but saying laugh- 
ingly, if any one alluded to it, that he made it an excuse for 
many indulgences which a wife would never have allowed 
him. And perhaps he was the only person in the world who 
did not think his sisters uninteresting and superfluous ; for his 
was one of those large-hearted, sweet-blooded natures that 
never know a narrow or a grudging thought ; epicurean, if 
you will, with no enthusiasm, no self-scourging sense of duty ; 
but yet, as you have seen, of a sufficiently subtle moral fibre 
to have an unwearying tenderness for obscure and monoto- 
nous suffering. It was his large-hearted indulgence that made 
him ignore his mother’s hardness towards her daughters, 
which was the more striking from its contrast with her doting 
fondness towards himself : he held it no virtue to frown at 
irremediable faults. 

See the difference between the impression a man makes on 
you when you walk by his side in familiar talk, or look at 
him in his home, and the figure he makes when seen from a 
lofty historical level, or even in the eyes of a critical neigh- 
bour who thinks of him as an embodied system or opinion 
rathet than as a man. Mr. Roe, the travelling preacher ” 
stationed at Treddleston, had included Mr. Irwine in a general 
statement concerning the Church clergy in the surrounding 
district, whom he described as men given up to the lusts of 
the flesh and the pride of life; hunting and shooting, and 
adorning their own houses; asking what shall we eat, and 
what shall we drink, and wherewithal shall we be clothed ?• — 
careless of dispensing the bread of life to their flocks, preach- 
ing at best but a carnal and soul-benumbing morality, and 
trafficking in the souls of men by receiving money for dis- 
charging the pastoral office in parishes where they did not so 
much as look on the faces of the people more than once a year. 

67 


ADAM BEDE 


The ecclesiastical historian, too, looking into parliamentary 
reports of that period, finds honourable members zealous for 
the Church, and untainted with any sympathy for the “ tribe 
of canting Methodists,” making statements scarcely less mel- 
ancholy than that of Mr. Roe. And it is impossible for me to 
say that Mr. Irwine was altogether belied by the generic clas- 
sification assigned him. He really had no very lofty aims, no 
theological enthusiasm. If I were closely questioned, I should 
be obliged to confess that he felt no serious alarms about the 
souls of his parishioners, and would have thought it a mere 
loss of time to talk in a doctrinal and awakening manner to 
old “ Feyther Taft,” or even to Chad Cranage, the blacksmith. 
If he had been in the habit of speaking theoretically, he would 
perhaps have said that the only healthy form religion could 
take in such minds was that of certain dim but strong emo- 
tions, sullusing themselves as a hallowing influence over the 
family affections and neighbourly duties. He thought the 
custom of baptism more important than its doctrine, and that 
the religious benefits the peasant drew from the church where 
his fathers worshipped and the sacred piece of turf where they 
lay buried were but slightly dependent on a clear understand- 
ing of the Liturgy or the sermon. Clearly the Rector was 
not what is called in these days an “ earnest ” man : he was 
fonder of church history than of divinity, and had much more 
insight into men’s characters than interest in their opinions; 
he was neither laborious, nor obviously self-denying, nor very 
copious in almsgiving, and his theology, you perceive, was lax. 
His mental palate, indeed, was rather pagan, and found a 
savouriness in a quotation from Sophocles or Theocritus that 
was quite absent from any text in Isaiah or Amos. But if you 
feed your young setter on raw flesh, how can you wonder at 
its retaining a relish for uncooked partridge in after-life ? and 
Mr. Irwine’s recollections of young enthusiasm and ambition 
were all associated with poetry and ethics that lay aloof from 
the Bible. 

On the other hand, I must plead, for I have an affectionate 
partiality towards the Rector’s memory, that he was not vin- 
dictive, — and some philanthropists have been so ; that he was 
not intolerant, — and there is a rumour that some , zealous 
theologians have not been altogether free from that blemish ; 

68 


THE RECTOR 


that although he would probably have declined to give his 
body to be burned in any public cause, and was far from be- 
stowing all his goods to feed the poor, he had that charity 
which has sometimes been lacking to very illustrious virtue, 
— he was tender to other men’s failings, and unwilling to im- 
pute evil. He was one of those men — and they are not the 
commonest — of whom we can know the best only by follow- 
ing them away from the market-place, the platform, and the 
pulpit, entering with them into their own homes, hearing the 
voice with which they speak to the young and aged about their 
own hearthstone, and witnessing their thoughful care for the 
every-day wants of every-day companions, who take all their 
kindness as a matter of course, and not as a subject for 
panegyric. 

Such men, happily, have lived in times when great abuses 
flourished, and have sometimes even been the living represent- 
atives of the abuses. That is a thought which might comfort 
us a little under the opposite fact, — that it is better some- 
times not to follow great reformers of abuses beyond the 
threshold of their homes. 

But w^hatever you may think of Mr. Irwine now, if you had 
met him that June afternoon riding on his gray cob, with his 
dogs running beside him — portly, upright, manly, with a 
good-natured smile on his finely turned lips as he talked to his 
dashing young companion on the bay mare, you must have 
felt that however ill he harmonized with sound theories of the 
clerical office, he somehow harmonized extremely well with 
that peaceful landscape. 

See them in the bright sunlight, interrupted every now and 
then by rolling masses of cloud, ascending the slope from the 
l^roxton side, where the tall gables and elms of the rectory 
predominate over the tiny whitewashed church. They will 
soon be in the parish of Hayslope; the gray church-tower and 
village roofs lie before them to the left, and farther on, to the 
right, they can just see the chimneys of the Hall Farm. 


69 


ADAM BEDE 


CHAPTER VI. 

THE HALL FARM. 

E vidently that gate is never opened, for the long 
grass and the great hemlocks grow close against it; 
and if it were opened, it is so rusty that the force necessary 
to turn it on its hinges v^^ould be lilcely to pull down the 
square stone-built pillars, to the detriment of the two stone 
lionesses which grin with a doubtful carnivorous affability 
above a coat of arms surmounting each of the pillars. It 
would be easy enough, by the aid of the nicks in the stone 
pillars, to climb over the brick wall with its smooth stone 
coping; but by putting our eyes close to the rusty bars of 
the gate, we can see the house well enough, and all but the 
very corners of the grassy enclosure. 

It is a very fine old place, of red brick, softened by a pale 
powdery lichen, which has dispersed itself with happy ir- 
regularity, so as to bring the red brick into terms of friendly 
companionship with the limestone ornaments surrounding 
the three gables, the windows, and the door-place. But the 
windows are patched with wooden panes, and the door, I 
think, is like the gate, — it is never opened : how it would 
groan and grate against the stone floor if it were ! For it is 
a solid, heavy, handsome door, and must once have been in 
the habit of shutting with a sonorous bang behind a liveried 
lackey, who had just seen his master and mistress off the 
grounds in a carriage and pair. 

But at present one might fancy the house in the early 
stage of a chancery suit, and that the fruit from that grand 
double row of walnut-trees on the right hand of the enclo- 
sure would fall and rot among the grass, if it were not that 
we heard the booming bark of dogs echoing from the 
great buildings at the back. And now the half-weaned 
calves that have been sheltering themselves in a gorse-built 
hovel against the left-hand wall, come out and set up a silly 
answer to that terrible bark, doubtless supposing that it has 
reference to buckets of milk. 

Yes, the house must be inhabited, and we will see by 
whom ; for imagination is a licensed trespasser, — it has no 

70 


THE HALL FARM 


fear of dogs, but may climb over walls and peep in at win- 
dows with impunity. Put your face to one of the glass panes 
in the right-hand window : what do you see ? A large open 
fireplace, with rusty dogs in it, and a bare boarded floor ; at 
the far end, fleeces of wool stacked up ; in the middle of the 
floor, some empty corn-bags. That is the furniture of the 
dining-room. And what through the left-hand window? 
Several clothes-horses, a pillion, a spinning-wheel, and an 
old box wide open, and stuffed full of coloured rags. At 
the edge of this box there lies a great wooden doll, which, 
so far as mutilation is concerned, bears a strong resemblance 
to the finest Greek sculpture, and especially in the total loss 
of its nose. Near it there is a little chair, and the butt-end of 
a boy’s leather long-lashed whip. 

The history of the house is plain now. It was once the 
residence of a country squire, whose family, probably dwin- 
dling down to mere spinsterhood, got merged in the more 
territorial name of Donnithorne. It was once the Hall; it 
is now the Hall Farm. Like the life in some coast-town that 
was once a watering-place and is now a port, where the 
genteel streets are silent and grass-grown, and the docks 
and warehouses busy and resonant, the life at the Hall has 
changed its focus, and no longer radiates from the parlour, 
but from the kitchen and the farmyard. 

Plenty of life there ! though this is the drowsiest time of 
the year, just before hay-harvest; and it is the drowsiest 
time of the day too, for it is close upon three by the sun, 
and it is half-past three by Mrs. Poyser’s handsome eight- 
day clock. But there is always a stronger sense of life 
when the sun is brilliant after rain ; and now he is pouring 
down his beams, and making sparkles among the wet straw, 
and lighting up every patch of vivid green moss on the red 
tiles of the cow-shed, and turning even the muddy water 
that is hurrying along the channel to the drain into a mirror 
for the yellow-billed ducks, who are seizing the opportunity 
of getting a drink with as much body in it as possible. 
There is quite a concert of noises; the great bull-dog, 
chained against the stables, is thrown into furious exas- 
peration by the unwary approach of a cock too near the 
mouth of his kennel, and sends forth a thundering bark, 

71 


ADAM BEDE 


which is answered by two fox-hounds shut up in the oppo- 
site cow-house; the old top-knotted hens, scratching with 
their chicks among the straw, set up a sympathetic croak- 
ing as the discomfited cock joins them ; a sow with her 
brood, all very muddy as to the legs, and curled as to the 
tail, throws in some deep staccato notes ; our friends the 
calves are bleating from the home croft ; and, under all, a 
fine ear discerns the continuous hum^of human voices. 

For the great barn-doors are thrown wide open, and men 
are busy there mending the harness, under the superintend- 
ence of Mr. Goby, the whittaw,” otherwise saddler, who 
entertains them with the latest Treddleston gossip. It is 
certainly rather an unfortunate day that Alick, the shepherd, 
has chosen for having the whittaws, since the morning 
turned out so wet ; and Mrs. Poyser has spoken her mind 
pretty strongly as to the dirt which the extra number of 
men’s shoes brought into the house at dinner-time. Indeed, 
she has not yet recovered her equanimity on the subject, 
though it is now nearly three hours since dinner, and the 
house-floor is perfectly clean again ; as clean as everything 
else in that wonderful house-place, where the only chance of 
collecting a few grains of dust would be to climb on the 
salt-coffer, and put your finger on the high mantel-shelf on 
which the glittering brass candlesticks are enjoying their 
summer sinecure ; for at this time of year, of course, every 
one goes to bed while it is yet light, or at least light enough 
to discern the outline of objects after you have bruised 
your shins against them. Surely nowhere else could an oak 
clock-case and an oak table have got to such a polish by 
the hand, — genuine “ elbow polish,” as Mrs. Poyser called 
it, for she thanked God she never had any of your varnished 
rubbish in her house. Hetty Sorrel often took the oppor- 
tunity, when her aunt’s back was turned, of looking at the 
pleasing reflection of herself in those polished surfaces, — 
for the oak table was usually turned up like a screen, and 
was more for ornament than for use; and she could see 
herself sometimes in the great round pewter dishes that were 
ranged on the shelves above the long deal dinner-table, or 
in the hobs of the grate, which always shone like jasper. 

Everything was looking at its brightest at this moment, 

72 


THE HALL FARM 


for the sun shone right on the pewter dishes, and from 
their reflecting surfaces pieasant jets of light were thrown 
on mellow oak and bright brass, and on a still pleasanter 
object than these ; for some of the rays fell on Dinah’s finely 
moulded cheek, and lit up her pale red hair to auburn, 
as she bent over the heavy household linen which she was 
mending for her aunt. No scene could have been more 
peaceful, if Mrs. Poyser, who was ironing a few things that 
still remained from the Monday’s wash, had not been mak- 
ing a frequent clinking with her iron, and moving to and 
fro whenever vshe wanted it to cool ; carrying the keen 
glance of her blue-gray eye from the kitchen to the dairy, 
where Hetty was making up the butter, and from the dairy 
to the back-kitchen, where Nancy was taking the pies out 
of the oven. ,Do not suppose, however, that Mrs. Poyser 
was elderly or shrewish in her appearance ; she was a good- 
looking woman, not more than eight-and-thirty, of fair com- 
plexion and sandy hair, well-shapen, light-footed ; the most 
conspicuous article in her attire was an ample checkered 
linen apron, which almost covered her skirt ; and nothing 
could be plainer or less noticeable than her cap and gown, 
for there was no weakness of which she was less tolerant 
than feminine vanity, and the preference of ornament to 
utility. The family likeness between her and her niece Di- 
nah Morris, with the contrast between her keenness and 
Dinah’s seraphic gentleness of expression, might have served 
a painter as an excellent suggestion for a Martha and Mary. 
Their eyes were just of the same colour ; but a striking test 
of the difference in their operation was seen in the de- 
meanour of Trip, the black-and-tan terrier, whenever that 
much-suspected dog unwarily exposed himself to the freez- 
ing arctic ray of Mrs. Poyser’s glance. Her tongue was not 
less keen than her eye, and whenever a damsel came within 
earshot, seemed to take up an unfinished lecture, as a barrel- 
organ takes up a tune, precisely at the point where it had 
^eft off. 

XThe fact that it was churning-day was another reason A^hy 
it was inconvenient to have the Avhittaws, and why, con- 
sequently, Mrs. Poyser should scold Molly the housemaid 
with unusual severity. To all appearance Molly had got 

73 


ADAM BEDE 


through her after-dinner work in an exemplary manner, 
had “ cleaned herself ” with great despatch, and now came 
to ask, submissively, if she should sit down to her spinning 
till milking-time. But this blameless conduct, according 
to Mrs. Poyser, shrouded a secret indulgence of unbecoming 
wishes, which she now dragged forth and held up to Molly’s 
view with cutting eloquence. 

“ Spinning, indeed ! It is n’t spinning as you ’d be at, I ’ll 
be bound, and let you have your own way. I never knew 
your equals for gallowsness. To think of a gell o’ your age 
wanting to go and sit with half-a-dozen men ! I ’d ha’ been 
ashamed to let the words pass over my lips if I ’d been you. 
And you, as have been here ever since last Michaelmas, and 
I hired you at Treddles’on stattits, without a bit o’ char- 
acter, — as I say, you might be grateful to be hired in that 
way to a respectable place ; and you knew no more o’ what 
belongs to work when you come here than the mawkin i’ 
the field. As poor a two-fisted thing as ever I saw, you 
know you was. Who taught you to scrub a floor, I should 
like to know ? Why, you ’d leave the dirt in heaps i’ the 
corners, — anybody ’ud think you ’d never been brought up 
among Christians. And as for spinning, why, you ’ve wasted 
as much as your wage i’ the flax you ’ve spoiled learning to 
spin. And you ’ve a right to 'feel that, and not to go about 
as gaping and as thoughtless as if you was beholding to 
nobody. Comb the wool for the whittaws, indeed ! That ’s 
what you ’d like to be doing, is it ? That ’s the way with 
you, — that ’s the road you ’d all like to go, headlongs to 
ruin. You ’re never easy till you ’ve got some sweetheart 
as is as big a fool as yourself : you think you ’ll be finely off 
when you ’re married, I dare say, and have got a three- 
legged stool to sit on, and never a blanket to cover you, 
and a bit o’ oat-cake for your dinner, as three children are 
a-snatching at.” 

I ’m sure I donna want t’ go wi’ the whittaws,” said 
Molly, whimpering, and quite overcome by this Dantean 
picture of her future ; “ on’y we allays used to comb the 
wool for’n at Mester Ottley’s, an’ so I just asked ye. I 
donna want to set eyes on the whittaws again; I wish I 
may never stir if I do.” 


74 


THE HALL FARM 


“ Mr. Ottley’s, indeed ! It ’s fine talking o’ what you did 
at Mr. Ottley’s. Your missis there might like her floors 
dirted wi’ whittaws for what I know. There ’s no knowing 
what people wonna like, — such ways as I ’ve heard of ! I 
never had a gell come into my house as seemed to know 
what cleaning was; I think people live like pigs, for my 
part. And as to that Betty as was dairymaid at Trent s be- 
fore she come to me, she ’d ha’ left the cheeses without turn- 
ing from week’s end to week’s end ; and the dairy thralls, I 
might ha’ wrote my name on ’em when I come down- 
stairs after my illness, as the doctor said it was inflamma- 
tion — it was a mercy 1 got well of it. And to think o’ your 
knowing no better, Molly, and been here a-going i’ nine 
months, and not for want o’ talking to, neither — and what 
are you stanning there for, like a jack as is run down, in- 

V stead o’ getting your wheel out? You’re a rare un for 
sitting down to your work a little while after it ’s time to 
put by.” 

“ Munny, my iron’s twite’ told; pease put it down to 
warm.” 

The small chirruping voice that uttered this request came 
from a little sunny-haired girl between three and four, who, 
seated on a high-chair at the end of the ironing-table, was 
arduously clutching the handle of a miniature iron with her 
tiny fat fist, and ironing rags with an assiduity that required 
her to put her little red tongue out as far as anatomy would 
allow. 

“ Cold, is it, my darling ? Bless your sweet face ! ” said 
Mrs. Poyser, who was remarkable for the facility with which 
she could relapse from her official objurgatory to one of 
fondness or of friendly converse. “ Never mind ! Mother ’s 
done her ironing now. She ’s going to put the ironing 
things away.” 

“ Munny, I tould ’ike to do into de barn to Tommy, to 
see de whittawd.” 

“No, no, no; Totty ’ud get her feet wet,” said Mrs. 
Poyser, carrying away her iron. “ Run into the dairy and 
see Cousin Hetty make the butter.” 

“ I tould ’ike a bit o’ pum-take,” rejoined Totty, who 
seemed to be provided witji several relays of requests; at 

75 


ADAM BEDE 


the same time taking the opportunity of her momentary 
leisure to put her fingers into a bowl of starch, and drag 
it down, so as to empty the contents with tolerable com- 
pleteness on to the ironing-sheet. 

“ Did ever anybody see the like ? ” screamed Mrs. Poyser, 
running towards the table when her eye had fallen on the 
blue stream. “ The child ’s allays i’ mischief if your back ’s 
turned a minute. What shall I do to you, you naughty, 
naughty gell ? ” 

Totty, however, had descended from her chair with great 
swiftness, and was already in retreat towards the dairy with 
a sort of waddling run, and an amount of fat on the nape of 
her neck which made her look like the metamorphosis of a 
white sucking-pig. 

The starch having been wiped up by Molly’s help, and the 
ironing apparatus put by, Mrs. Poyser took up her knitting, 
which always lay ready at hand, and was the work she liked 
best, because she could carry it on automatically as she 
walked to and fro. But now she came and sat down oppo- 
site Dinah, whom she looked at in a meditative way, as she 
knitted her gray worsted stocking. 

“ You look th’ image o’ your aunt Judith, Dinah, when 
you sit a-sewing. I could almost fancy it was thirty years 
back, and I was a little gell at home, looking at Judith as 
she sat at her work, after she ’d done the house up ; only 
it was a little cottage, father’s was, and not a big rambling 
house as gets dirty i’ one corner as fast as you clean it in 
another; but for all that, I could fancy you was your aunt 
Judith, only her hair was a deal darker than yours, and she 
was stouter and broader i’ the shoulders. Judith and me 
allays hung together, though she had such queer ways, but 
your mother and her never could agree. Ah ! your mother 
little thought as she ’d have a daughter just cut out after 
the very pattern o’ Judith, and leave her an orphan, too, for 
Judith to take care on, and bring up with a spoon when 
she was in the graveyard at Stoniton. I allays said that o’ 
Judith, as she ’d bear a pound weight any day, to save any- 
body else carrying a ounce. And she was just the same 
from the first o’ my remembering her; it made no differ- 
ence in her, as I could see, when she took to the Methodists, 

76 


THE HALL FARM 


only she talked a bit different, and wore a different sort o’ 
cap ; but she never in her life spent a penny on herself more 
than keeping herself decent.” 

“ She was a blessed woman,” said Dinah ; “ God had 
given her a loving, self-forgetting nature, and he perfected 
it by grace. And she was very fond of you too. Aunt Rachel. 
I Ve often heard her talk of you in the same sort of way. 
When she had that bad illness, and I was only eleven years 
old, she used to say, ‘ You ’ll have a friend on earth in your 
Aunt Rachel, if I ’m taken from you, for she has a kind 
heart ; ’ and I ’m sure I ’ve found it so.” 

“ I don’t know how, child ; anybody ’ud be cunning to 
do anything for you, I think ; you ’re like the birds o’ th’ 
air, and live nobody knows how. I ’d ha’ been glad to be- 
have to you like a mother’s sister, if you ’d come and live i’ 
this country, where there ’s some shelter and victual for man 
and beast, and folks don’t live on the naked hills, like poul- 
try a-scratching on a gravel-bank. And then you might get 
married to some decent man ; and there ’d be plenty ready 
to have you, if you ’d only leave off that preaching, as is 
ten times worse than anything your aunt Judith ever did. 
And even if you ’d marry Seth Bede, as is a poor wool- 
gathering Methodist, and ’s never like to have a penny be- 
forehand, I know your uncle ’ud help you with a pig, and 
very like a cow, for he ’s allays been good-natur’d to my 
kin, for all they ’re poor, and made ’em welcome to the 
house ; and ’ud do for you, I ’ll be bound, as much as ever 
he ’d do for Hetty, though she ’s his own niece. And there ’s 
linen in the house as I could well spare you, for I ’ve got 
lots o’ sheeting and table-clothing and towelling as is n’t 
made up. There ’s a piece o’ sheeting I could give you as 
that squinting Kitty spun, — she was a rare girl to spin, for 
all she squinted, and the children could n’t abide her ; and, 
you know, the spinning ’s going on constant, and there ’s 
new linen wove twice as fast as the old wears out. But 
where ’s the use o’ talking, if ye wonna be persuaded, and 
settle down like any other woman in her senses, istead o’ 
wearing yourself out with walking and preaching, and giv- 
ing away every penny you get, so as yau ’ve nothing saved 
against sickness ; and all the things you ’ve got i’ the world, 

77 


ADAM BEDE 


I verily believe, ’ud go into a bundle no bigger nor a double 
cheese. And all because you ’ve got notions i’ your head 
about religion more nor what ’s i’ the Catechism and the 
Prayer Book.” 

'' But not more than what ’s in the Bible, aunt,” said 
Dinah. 

Yes, and the Bible too, for that matter,” Mrs. Poyser re- 
joined rather sharply ; “ else why should n’t them as know 
best what ’s in the Bible — the parsons and people as have 
got nothing to do but learn it — do the same as you do? 
But, for the matter o’ that, if everybody was to do like you, 
the world must come to a standstill ; for if everybody tried 
to do without house and home, and with poor eating and 
drinking, and was allays talking as we must despise the 
things o’ the world, as you say, I should like to know where 
the pick o’ the stock and the corn, and the best new-milk 
cheeses ’ud have to go. Everybody ’ud be wanting bread 
made o’ tail ends, and everybody ’ud be running after every- 
body else to preach to ’em, istead o’ bringing up their fam- 
ilies, and laying by against a bad harvest. It stands to sense 
as that can’t be the right religion.” 

Nay, dear aunt, you never heard me say that all people 
are called to forsake their work and their families. It ’s 
quite right the land should be ploughed and sowed, and the 
precious corn stored, and the things of this life cared for, 
and right that people should rejoice in their families and 
provide for them, so that this is done in the fear of the Lord, 
and that they are not unmindful of the soul’s wants while 
they are caring for the body. We can all be servants of 
God wherever our lot is cast, but he gives us different sorts 
of work, according as he fits us for it and calls us to it. I 
can no more help spending my life in trying to do what I can 
for the souls of others, than you could help running if you 
heard little Totty crying at the other end of the house ; the 
voice would go to your heart, you would think the dear 
child was in trouble or in danger, and you could n’t rest 
without running to help her and comfort her.” 

“ Ah,” said Mrs. Poyser, rising and walking towards the 
door, '' I know it ’ud be just the same if I was to talk to 
you for hours. You ’d make me the same answer to th’ end. 

78 


THE HALL FARM 


I might as well talk to the running brook, and tell it to 
Stan’ still.” 

The causeway outside the kitchen door was dry enough 
now for Mrs. Poyser to stand there quite pleasantly and 
see what was going on in the yard, the gray worsted stock- 
ing making a steady progress in her hands all the while. 
But she had not been standing there more than five minutes 
before she came in again, and said to Dipah, in rather a flur- 
ried, awe-stricken tone, — 

“ If there is n’t Captain Donnithorne and Mr. Irwine 
a-coming into the yard ! I ’ll lay my life they ’re come to 
speak about your preaching on the Green, Dinah ; it ’s you 
must answer ’em, for I ’m dumb. I ’ve said enough a’ready 
about your bringing such disgrace upo’ your uncle’s family. 
I would n’t ha’ minded if you ’d been Mr. Poyser’s own 
niece ; folks must put up wi’ their own kin, as they put up 
wi’ their own noses, — it s their own flesh and blood. But 
to think of a niece o’ mine being cause o’ my husband’s be- 
ing turned out of his farm, and me brought him no fortin 
but my savin’s — ” 

“ Nay, dear aunt Rachel,” said Dinah, gently, you ’ve 
no cause for such fears. I ’ve strong assurance that no evil 
will happen to you and my uncle and the children from 
anything I ’ve done. I did n’t preach without direction.” 

“ Direction ! I know very well what you mean by di- 
rection,” said Mrs. Poyser, knitting in a rapid and agitated 
manner. “ When there ’s a bigger maggot than usial in 
your head, you call it ‘ direction ; ’ and then nothing can stir 
you, — you look like the statty o’ the outside o’ Treddles’on 
church, a-starin’ and a-smilin’ whether it ’s fair weather or 
foul. I hanna common patience with you.” 

By this time the two gentlemen had reached the palings, 
and had got down from their horses: it was plain they 
meant to come in. Mrs. Poyser advanced to the door to 
meet them, courtesying low, and trembling between anger 
with Dinah and anxiety to conduct herself with perfect pro- 
priety on the occasion; for in those days the keenest of 
bucolic minds felt a whispering awe at the sight of the gen- 
try, such as of old men felt when they stood on tiptoe to 
watch the gods passing by in tall human shape. 

79 


ADAM BEDE 


“ Well, Mrs. Poyser, how are you after this stormy morn- 
ing?” said Mr. Irwine, with his stately cordiality. “Our 
feet are quite dry ; we shall not soil your beautiful floor.” 

“ Oh, sir, don’t mention it,” said Mrs. Poyser. “ Will 
you and the Captain please to walk into the parlour ? ” 

“ No, indeed, thank you, Mrs. Poyser,” said the Captain, 
looking eagerly round the kitchen, as if his eye were seek- 
ing something it could not find. “ I delight in your kitchen. 
I think it is the most charming room I know. I should like 
every farmer’s wife to come and look at it for a pattern.” 

“ Oh, you ’re pleased to say so, sir. Pray take a seat,” 
said Mrs. Poyser, relieved a little by this compliment and 
the Captain’s evident good-humour, but still glancing anx- 
iously at Mr. Irwine, who, she saw, was looking at Dinah 
and advancing towards her. 

“Poyser is not at home, is he?” said Captain Donni- 
thorne, seating himself where he could see along the short 
passage to the open dairy-door. 

“ No, sir, he is n’t ; he ’s gone to Rosseter to see Mr. West, 
the factor, about the wool. But there ’s father i’ the barn, 
sir, if he ’d be of any use.” 

“ No, thank you ; I ’ll just look at the whelps, and leave 
a message about them with your shepherd. I must come 
another day and see your husband ; I want to have a con- 
sultation with him about horses. Do you know when he ’s 
likely to be at liberty ? ” 

“ Why, sir, you can hardly miss him, except it ’s o’ Tred- 
dles’on market-day, — that’s of a Friday, you know. For 
if he ’s anywhere on the farm, we can send for him in a 
minute. If we ’d got rid o’ the Scantlands, we should have 
no outlying fields; and I should be glad of it, for if ever 
anything happens he ’s sure to be gone to the Scantlands. 
Things allays happen so contrairy, if they ’ve a chance ; 
and it ’s an unnat’ral thing to have one bit o’ your farm in 
one county and all the rest in another.” 

“ Ah, the Scantlands would go much better with 
Choyce’s farm, especially as he wants dairy-land and you Ve 
got plenty. I think yours is the prettiest farm on the estate, 
though ; and do you know, Mrs. Poyser, if I were going to 

8o 


THE HALL FARM 


marry and settle, I should be tempted to turn you out, and 
do up this fine old house, and turn farmer myself.” 

“ Oh, sir,” said Mrs. Poyser, rather alarmed, you 
would n’t like it at all. As for farming, it ’s putting money 
into your pocket wi’ your right hand and fetching it out wi’ 
your left. As fur as I can see, it ’s raising victual for other 
folks, and just getting a mouthful for yourself and your 
children as you go along. Not as you ’d be like a poor man 
as wants to get his bread : you could afford to lose as much 
money as you liked i’ farming ; but it ’s poor fun losing 
money, I should think, though I understan’ it ’s what the 
great folks i’ London play at more than anything. For my 
husband heard at market as Lord Dacey’s eldest son had 
lost thousands upo’ thousands to the Prince o’ Wales, and 
they say my lady was going to pawn her jewels to pay for 
him. But you know more about that than I do, sir. But 
as for farming, sir, I canna think as you ’d like it ; and this 
house — the draughts in it are enough to cut you through, 
and it ’s my opinion the floors upstairs are very rotten, and 
the rats i’ the cellar are beyond anything.” 

Why, that ’s a terrible picture, Mrs. Poyser. I think I 
should be doing you a service to turn you out of such a 
place. But there ’s no chance of that. I ’m not likely to 
settle for the next twenty years, till I ’m a stout gentleman 
of forty ; and my grandfather would never consent to part 
with such good tenants as you.” 

“ Well, sir, if he thinks so well o’ Mr. Poyser for a tenant, 
I wish you could put in a word for him to allow us some 
new gates for the Five closes, for my husband ’s been asking 
and asking till he ’s tired, and to think o’ what he ’s done 
for the farm, and ’s never had a penny allowed him, be the 
times bad or good. And as I ’ve said to my husband often 
and often, I ’m sure if the Captain had anything to do with 
it, it would n’t be so. Not as I wish to speak disrespectful 
o’ them as have got the power i’ their hands, but it ’s more 
than flesh and blood ’ull bear sometimes, to be toiling and 
striving, and up early and down late, and hardly sleeping a 
wink when you lie down for thinking as the cheese may 
swell, or the cows may slip their calf, or the wheat may grow 
green again i’ the sheaf, — and after all, at th’ end o’ the 

8t 


6 


ADAM BEDE 


year, it ’s like as if you ’d been cooking a feast and had got 
the smell of it for your pains.” 

Mrs. Poyser, once launched into conversation, always 
sailed along without any check from her preliminary awe 
of the gentry. I'he confidence she felt in her own powers 
of exposition was a motive force that overcame all resist- 
ance. 

“ I ’m afraid I should only do harm instead of good, if 
I were to speak about the gates, Mrs. Poyser,” said the 
Captain, ” though I assure you there ’s no man on the estate 
I would sooner say a word for than your husband. I know 
his farm is in better order than any other within ten miles 
of us ; and as for the kitchen,” he added, smiling, I don’t 
believe there ’s one in the kingdom to beat it. By the by, 
I ’ve never seen your dairy : I must see your dairy, Mrs. 
Poyser.” 

“ Indeed, sir, it ’s not fit for you to go in, for Hetty ’s in 
the middle o’ making the butter, for the churning was 
thrown late, and I ’m quite ashamed.” This Mrs. Poyser 
said blushing, and believing that the Captain was really 
interested in her milk-pans, and would adjust his opinion of 
her to the appearance of her dairy. 

“ Oh, I ’ve no doubt it ’s in capital order. Take me in,” 
said the Captain, himself leading the way, while Mrs. Poyser 
followed. 


CHAPTER VII. 


THE DAIRY. 



HE dairy was certainly worth looking at: it was a 


A scene to sicken for with a sort of calenture in hot 
and dusty streets, — such coolness, such purity, such fresh 
fragrance of new-pressed cheese, of firm butter, of wooden 
vessels perpetually bathed in pure water; such soft colour- 
ing of red earthenware and creamy surfaces, brown wood 
and polished tin, gray limestone and rich orange-red rust 
on the iron weights and hooks and hinges. But one gets 
only a confused notion of these details when they surround 


82 


THE DAIRY 


a distractingly pretty girl of seventeen, standing on little 
pattens and rounding her dimpled arm to lift a pound of 
butter out of the scale. 

Hetty blushed a deep rose-colour when Captain Donni- 
thorne entered the dairy and spoke to her; but it was not 
at all a distressed blush, for it was inwreathed with smiles 
and dimples, and with sparkles from under long curled dark 
eyelashes ; and while her aunt was discoursing to him about 
the limited amount of milk that was to be spared for butter 
and cheese so long as the calves were not all weaned, and a 
large quantity but inferior quality of milk yielded by the 
short-horn, which had been bought on experiment, to- 
gether with other matters which must be interesting to a 
young gentleman who would one day be a landlord, Hetty 
tossed and patted her pound of butter with quite a self- 
possessed, coquettish air, slyly conscious that no turn of 
her head was lost. 

There are various orders of beauty, causing men to make 
fools of themselves in various styles, from the desperate 
to the sheepish ; but there is one order of beauty which 
seems made to turn the heads not only of men, but of all 
intelligent mammals, even of women. It is a beauty like 
that of kittens, or very small downy ducks making gentle 
rippling noises with their soft bills, or babies just begin- 
ning to toddle and to engage in conscious mischief, — a 
beauty with which you can never be angry, but that you 
feel ready to crush for inability to comprehend the state of 
mind into which it throws you. Hetty Sorrel’s was that 
sort of beauty. Her aunt, Mrs., Poyser, who professed to 
despise all personal attractions, and intended to be the 
severest of mentors, continually gazed at Hetty’s charms 
by the sly, fascinated in spite of herself, and after adminis- 
tering such a scolding as naturally flowed from her anx- 
iety to do well by her husband’s niece, — who had no 
mother of her own to scold her, poor thing ! — she would 
often confess to her husband, when they were safe out of 
hearing, that she firmly believed, “ the naughtier the little 
hussy behaved, the prettier she looked.” 

It is of little use for me to tell you that Hetty’s cheek 
was like a rose-petal, that dimples played about her pouting 

83 


ADAM BEDE 


lips, that her large dark eyes hid a soft roguishness under 
their long lashes, and that her curly hair, though all pushed 
back under her round cap while she was at work, stole 
back in dark delicate rings on her forehead and about her 
white shell-like ears; it is of little use for me to say how 
lovely was the contour of her pink-and-white neckerchief, 
tucked into her low plum-coloured stuff bodice, or how the 
linen butter-making apron, with its bib, seemed a thing to 
be imitated in silk by duchesses, since it fell in such charm- 
ing lines, or how her brown stockings and thick-soled 
buckled shoes lost all that clumsiness which they must cer- 
tainly have had when empty of her foot and ankle, — of 
little use, unless you have seen a woman who affected you 
as Hetty affected her beholders ; for otherwise, though you 
might conjure up the image of a lovely woman, she would 
not in the least resemble that distracting, kitten-like maiden. 
I might mention all the divine charms of a bright spring day; 
but if you had never in your life utterly forgotten yourself 
in straining your eyes after the mounting lark, or in wan- 
dering through the still lanes when the fresh-opened blos- 
soms fill them with a sacred silent beauty like that of 
fretted aisles, where would be the use of my descriptive cata- 
logue? I could never make you know what I meant by a 
bright spring day. Hetty’s was a spring-tide beauty; it 
was the beauty of young frisking things, round-limbed, 
gambolling, circumventing you by a false air of innocence, 
— the innocence of a young star-browed calf, for example, 
that, being inclined for a promenade out of bounds, leads 
you a severe steeple-chase over hedge and ditch, and only 
comes to a stand in the middle of a bog. 

And they are the prettiest attitudes and movements into 
which a pretty girl is thrown in making up butter, — tossing 
movements that give a charming curve to the arm, and a 
sideward inclination of the round white neck ; little patting 
and rolling movements with the palm of the hand, and nice 
adaptations and finishings which cannot at all be effected 
without a great play of the pouting mouth and the dark 
eyes. And then the butter itself seems to communicate a 
fresh charm, — it is so pure, so sweet-scented; it is turned 
off the mould with such a beautiful firm surface, like marble 

84 


THE DAIRY 


in a pale yellow light! Moreover, Hetty was particularly 
clever at making up the butter; it was the one perform- 
ance of hers that her aunt allowed to pass without severe 
criticism ; so she handled it with all the grace that belongs 
to mastery. 

I hope you will be ready for a great holiday on the 30th 
of July, Mrs. Poyser,” said Captain Donnithorne, when 
he had sufficiently admired the dairy, and given several im- 
provised opinions on Swede turnips and short-horns. “ You 
know what is to happen then, and I shall expect you to be 
one of the guests who come earliest and leave latest. Will 
you prornise me your hand for two dances. Miss Hetty? 
If I don’t get your promise now, I know I shall hardly 
have a chance, for all the smart young farmers will take 
care to secure you.” 

Hetty smiled and blushed; but before she could answer, 
Mrs. Poyser interposed, scandalized at the mere sugges- 
tion that the young squire could be excluded by any meaner 
partners. 

“ Indeed, sir, you are very kind to take that notice of her. 
And I ’m sure, whenever you ’re pleased to dance with her, 
she ’ll be proud and thankful, if she stood still all the rest 
o’ th’ evening.” 

“ Oh, no, no, that would be too cruel to all the other 
young fellows who can dance. But you will promise me 
two dances, won’t you ? ” the Captain continued, deter- 
mined to make Hetty look at him and speak to him. 

Hetty dropped the prettiest little courtesy, and stole a 
half-sh}^, half-coquettish glance at him as she said, — 

Yes, thank you, sir.” 

“ And you must bring all your children, you know, Mrs. 
Poyser; your little Totty, as well as the boys. I want all 
the youngest children on the estate to be there, — all those 
who will be fine young men and women when I ’m a bald old 
fellow.” 

“ Oh, dear, sir, that ’ull be a long time first,” said Mrs. 
Poyser, quite overcome at the young squire’s speaking so 
lightly of himself, and thinking how her husband would be 
interested in hearing her recount this remarkable specimen 
of high-born humour. The Captain was thought to be very 

^^5 


ADAM BEDE 


full of his jokes/' and was a great favourite throughout the 
estate on account of his free manners. Every tenant was 
quite sure things would be different when the reins got into 
his hands, — there was to be a millennial abundance of new 
gates, allowances of lime, and returns of ten per cent. 

“ But where is Totty to-day ? " he said. “ I want to see 
her.” 

“ Where is the little un, Hetty ? ” said Mrs. Poyser. “ She 
came in here not long ago.” 

“ I don’t know. She went into the brewhouse to Nancy, 
I think.” 

The proud mother, unable to resist the temptation to show 
her Totty, passed at once into the back-kitchen in search of 
her, not, however, without misgivings lest something should 
have happened to render her person and attire unfit for 
presentation. 

“ And do you carry the butter to market when you ’ve 
made it ? ” said the Captain to Hetty, meanwhile. 

“ Oh, no, sir ; not when it ’s so heavy : I ’m not strong 
enough to carry it. Alick takes it on horseback.” 

“No, I ’m sure your pretty arms were never meant for 
such heavy weights. But you go out a walk sometimes 
these pleasant evenings, don’t you? Why don’t you have a 
walk in the Chase sometimes, now it ’s so green and pleas- 
ant ? I hardly ever see you anywhere except at home and at 
church.” 

“ Aunt does n’t like me to go a-walking only when I ’m 
going somewhere,” said Hetty. “ But I go through the 
Chase sometimes.” * 

“ And don’t you ever go to see Mrs. Best, the house- 
keeper ? I think T saw you once in the housekeeper’s room.” 

“ It is n’t Mrs. Best, it ’s Mrs. Pomfret, the lady’s-maid, 
as I go to see. She ’s teaching me tent-stitch and the lace- 
mending. I ’m going to tea with her to-morrow afternoon”’ 

The reason why there had been space for this tHe-a-tHe 
can only be known by looking into the back-kitchen, where 
Totty had been discovered rubbing a stray blue-bag against 
her nose, and in the same moment allowing some liberal 
indigo drops to fall on her afternoon pinafore. But now 
she appeared holding her mother’s hand, — the end of her 


86 


THE DAIRY 


round nose rather shiny from a recent and hurried applica- 
tion of soap and water. 

“ Here she is ! ” said the Captain, lifting her up and setting 
her on the low stone shelf. “ Here ’s Totty ! By the by, 
what ’s her other name? She wasn’t christened Totty.” 

Oh, sir, we call her sadly out of her name. Charlotte ’s 
her christened name. It ’s a name i’ Mr. Poyser’s family : 
his grandmother was named Charlotte. But we began with 
calling her Lotty, and now it ’s got to Totty. To be sure, 
it ’s more like a name for a dog than a Christian child.” 

“ Totty ’s a capital name. Why, she looks like a Totty. 
Has she got a pocket on ? ” said the Captain, feeling in his 
own waistcoat pockets. 

Totty immediately with great gravity lifted up her frock, 
and showed a tiny pink pocket, at present in a' state of col- 
lapse. 

“ It dot not’in’ in it,” she said, as she looked down at it 
very earnestly. 

No! what a pity! such a pretty pocket. Well, I think 
I ’ve got some things in mine that will make a pretty jingle 
in it. Yes! I declare I ’ve got five little round silver things, 
and hear what a pretty noise they make in Totty’s pink 
pocket.” 

Here he shook the pocket with the five sixpences in it, 
and Totty showed her teeth and wrinkled her nose in great 
glee; but divining that there was nothing more to be got 
by staying, she jumped off the shelf and ran away to jingle 
her pocket in the hearing of Nancy, while her mother called 
after her, — 

“ Oh, for shame, you naughty gell ! not to thank the 
Captain for what he ’s given you. I ’m sure, sir, it ’s very 
kind of you ; but she ’s spoiled shameful ; her father won’t 
have her said nay in anything, and there ’s no managing 
her. It ’s being the youngest, and th’ only gell.” 

“ Oh, she ’s a funny little fatty ; I would n’t have her dif- 
ferent. But I must be going now, for I suppose the Rector 
is waiting for me.” 

With a “ good-by,” a bright glance, and a bow to Hetty, 
Arthur left the dairy. But he was mistaken in imagining 
himself waited for. The Rector had been so much inter- 

87 


ADAM BEDE 


ested in his conversation with Dinah that he would not 
have chosen to close it earlier ; and you shall hear now 
what they had been saying to each other. 


CHAPTER VIII. 

A VOCATION. 

D inah, who had risen when the gentlemen came in, but 
still kept hold of the sheet she was mending, courte- 
sied respectfully when she saw Mr. Irwine looking at her and 
advancing towards her. He had never yet spoken to her, or 
stood face to face with her ; and her first thought, as her eyes 
met his, was, ‘‘ What a well-favoured countenance ! Oh that 
the good seed might fall on that soil, for it would surely 
flourish ! ” The agreeable impression must have been mutual, 
for Mr. Irwine bowed to her with a benignant deference, 
which would have been equally in place if she had been the 
most dignified lady of his acquaintance. 

“ You are only a visitor in this neighbourhood, I think? 
were his first words, as he seated himself opposite to her. 

“ No, sir, I come from Snowfield, in Stonyshire. But my 
aunt was very kind, wanting me to have rest from my work 
there, because I ’d been ill, and she invited me to come and 
stay with her for a while.” 

“Ah, I remember Snowfield very well; I once had occa- 
sion to go there. It ’s a dreary, bleak place. They were 
building a cotton-mill there ; but that ’s many years ago now. 
I suppose the place is a good deal changed by the emplo}^- 
ment that mill must have brought.” 

“ It is changed so far as the mill has brought people there, 
who get a livelihood for themselves by working in it, and 
make it better for the trades-folks. I work in it myself, and 
have reason to be grateful, for thereby I have enough and to 
spare. But it ’s still a bleak place, as you say, sir, — very 
different from this country.” 

“ You have relations living there, probably, so that you 
are attached to the place as your home ? ” 

88 


A VOCATION 


I had an aunt there once ; she brought me up, for I was 
an orphan. But she was taken away seven years ago, and I 
have no other kindred that I know of, besides my aunt Poy- 
ser, who is very good to me, and would have me come and 
live in this country, which to be sure is a good land, wherein 
they eat bread without scarceness. But I ’m not free to leave 
Snowfield, where I was first planted, and have grown deep 
into it, like the small grass on the hill-top.” 

Ah, I dare say you have many religious friends and com- 
panions there; you are a Methodist, — Wesleyan, I think?” 

“ Yes, my aunt at Snowfield belonged to the Society, and 
I have cause to be thankful for the privileges I have had 
thereby from my earliest childhood.” 

“ And have you been long in the habit of preaching ? — 
for I understand you preached at Hayslope last night.” 

“ I first took to the work four years since, when I was 
twenty-one.” 

‘'Your Society sanctions women’s preaching, then?” 

“ It does n’t forbid them, sir, when they ’ve a clear call 
to the work, and when their ministry is owned by the con- 
version of sinners and the strengthening of God’s people. 
Mrs. Fletcher, as you may have heard about, was the first 
W’oman to preach in the Society, I believe, before she was 
married, when she was Miss Bosanquet; and Mr. Wesley 
approved of her undertaking the work. She had a great gift, 
and there are many others now living who are precious fel- 
low-helpers in the work of the ministry. I understand there ’s 
been voices raised against it in the Society of late, but I can- 
not but think their counsel will come to nought. It is n’t 
for men to make channels for God’s Spirit, as they make 
channels for the water-courses, and say, ‘ Flow here, but not 
there.’ ” 

“ But don’t you find some danger among your people — I 
don’t mean to say that it is so with you, far from it — but don’t 
you find sometimes that both men and women fancy them- 
selves channels for God’s Spirit, and are quite mistaken, so 
that they set about a work for which they are unfit, and bring 
holy things into contempt ? ” 

“ Doubtless it is so sometimes ; for there have been evil- 
doers among us who have sought to deceive the brethren, 

89 


ADAM BEDE 


and some there are who deceive their own selves. But we 
are not without discipline and correction to put a check upon 
these things. There ’s a very strict order kept among us, 
and the brethren and sisters watch for each other’s souls as 
they that must give account. They don’t go every one his 
own way and say, ‘ Am I my brother’s keeper ? ’ ” 

“ But tell me — if I may ask, and I am really interested in 
knowing it — how you first came to think of preaching ? ” 

“ Indeed, sir, I did n’t think of it at all. I ’d been used 
from the time I was sixteen to talk to the little children and 
teach them, and sometimes I had had my heart enlarged to 
speak in class, and was much drawn out in prayer with the 
sick. But I had felt no call to preach ; for when I ’m not great- 
ly wrought upon, I ’m too much given to sit still and keep by 
myself: it seems as if I could sit silent all day long with the 
thought of God overflowing my soul, — as the pebbles lie 
bathed in the Willow Brook. For thoughts are so great, — 
are n’t they, sir ? They seem to lie upon us like a deep flood ; 
and it ’s my besetment to forget where I am and everything 
about me, and lose myself in thoughts that I could give no 
account of, for I could neither make a beginning nor ending 
of them in words. That was my way as long as I can re- 
member; but sometimes it seemed as if speech came to me 
without any will of my own, and words were given to me that 
came out as the tears come, because our hearts are full and 
we can’t help it. And those were always times of great bless- 
ing, though I never thought it could be so with me before a 
congregation of people. But, sir, we are led on, like the 
little children, by a way that we know not. I was called to 
preach quite suddenly, and since then I have never been left 
in doubt about the work that was laid upon me.” 

“ But tell me the circumstances, — just how it was, the very 
day you began to preach.” 

It was one Sunday I walked with brother Marlowe, who 
was an aged man, one of the local preachers, all the way to 
Hetton-Deeps, — that ’s a village where the people get their 
living by working in the lead-mines, and where there ’s no 
church nor preacher, but they live like sheep without a shep- 
herd. It ’s better than twelve miles from Snowfield, so we 
set out early in the morning, for it was summer-time ; and I 


go 


A VOCATION 


had a wonderful sense of the Divine love as we walked over 
the hills, where there ’s no trees, you know, sir, as there is 
here, to make the sky look smaller, but you see the heavens 
stretched out like a tent, and you feel the everlasting arms 
around you. But before we got to Hetton, brother Marlowe 
was seized with a dizziness that made him afraid of' falling, 
for he overworked himself sadly, at his years, in watching 
and praying, and walking so many miles to speak the Word, 
as well as carrying on his trade of linen- weaving. And when 
we got to the village, the people were expecting him, for he ’d 
appointed the time and the place when he was there before, 
and such of them as cared to hear the Word of Life were 
assembled on a spot where the cottages was thickest, so as 
others might be drawn to come. But he felt as he could n’t 
stand up 'to preach, and he was forced to lie down in the first 
of the cottages we came to. So I went to tell the people, 
thinking we ’d go into one of the houses, and I would read 
and pray with them. But as I passed along by the cottages, 
and saw the aged and trembling women at the doors, and the 
hard looks of the men, w’ho seemed to have their eyes no more 
filled with the sight of the Sabbath morning than if they had 
been dumb oxen that never looked up to the sky, I felt a great 
movement in my soul, and I trembled as if I was shaken by a 
strong spirit entering into my weak body. And I went to 
where the little flock of people was gathered together, and 
stepped on the low wall that was built against the green hill- 
side, and I spoke the words that were given to me abundantly. 
And they all came round me out of all the cottages, and many 
wept over their sins, and have since been joined to the Lord. 
That was the beginning of my preaching, sir, and I ’ve 
preached ever since.” 

Dinah had let her work fall during this narrative, which 
she uttered in her usual simple way, but with that sincere, 
articulate, thrilling treble by which she always mastered her 
audience. She stooped now to gather up her sewing, and then 
went on with it as before. Mr. Irwine was deeply interested. 
He said to himself: He must be a miserable prig who would 
act the pedagogue here: one might as well go and lecture the 
trees for growing in their own shape.” 

And you never feel any embarrassment from the sense of 

91 


ADAM BEDE 


your youth, — that you are a lovely young woman on whom 
men’s eyes are fixed? ” he said aloud. 

“ No, I Ve no room for such feelings, and don’t believe the 
people ever take notice about that. I think, sir, when God 
makes his presence felt through us, we are like the burning 
bush: Moses never took any heed what sort of bush it was, 
— he only saw the brightness of the Lord. I ’ve preached to 
as rough, ignorant people as can be in the villages about 
Snowfield, — men that looked very hard and wild ; but they 
never said an uncivil word to me, and often thanked me kind- 
ly as they made way for me to pass through the midst of 
them.” 

“ That I can believe, — that I can well believe,” said Mr. 
Irwine, emphatically. “ And what did you think of your 
hearers last night, now? Did you find them quiet and atten- 
tive ? ” 

“Very quiet, sir; but I saw no signs of any great work 
upon them, except in a young girl named Bessy Cranage, 
towards whom my heart yearned greatly, when my eyes first 
fell on her blooming youth, given up to folly and vanity. I 
had some private talk and prayer with her afterwards, and I 
trust her heart is touched. But I ’ve noticed that in these 
villages where the people lead a quiet life among the green 
pastures and the still waters, tilling the ground and tending 
the cattle, there ’s a strange deadness to the Word, as different 
as can be from the great towns, like Leeds, where I once went 
to visit a holy woman who preaches there. It ’s wonderful 
how rich is the harvest of souls up those high-walled streets, 
where you seemed to walk as in a prison-yard, and the ear is 
deafened with the sounds of worldly toil. I think maybe -it 
is because the promise is sweeter when this life is so dark and 
weary, and the soul gets more hungry when the body is ill 
at ease.” 

“ Why, yes, our farm-labourers are not easily roused. They 
take life almost as slowly as the sheep and cows. But we have 
some intelligent workmen about here. I dare say you know 
the Bedes ; Seth Bede, by the by, is a Methodist.” 

“ Yes, I know Seth well, and his brother Adam a little. 
Seth is a gracious young man, — sincere and without offence ; 
and Adam is like the patriarch Joseph, for his great skill and 

92 


A VOCATION 


knowledge, and the kindness he shows to his brother and his 
parents.” 

“ Perhaps you don’t know the trouble that has just hap- 
pened to them ? Their father, Matthias Bede, . was drowned 
in the Willow Brook last night, not far from his own door. 
I ’m going now to see Adam.” 

“ Ah, their poor aged mother ! ” said Dinah, dropping her 
hands, and looking before her with pitying eyes, as if she saw 
the object of her sympathy. “ She will mourn heavily ; for 
Seth has told me she ’s of an anxious, troubled heart. I must 
go and see if I can give her any help.” 

As she rose and was beginning to fold up her work. Cap- 
tain Donnithorne, having exhausted all plausible pretexts for 
remaining among the milk-pans, came out of the dairy, fol- 
lowed by Mrs. Poyser. Mr. Irwine now rose also, and ad- 
vancing towards Dinah, held out his hand and said, — 

“ Good-by. I hear you are going away soon ; but this will 
not be the last visit you will pay your aunt, — so we shall 
meet again, I hope.” 

His cordiality towards Dinah set all Mrs. Poyser’s anxie- 
ties at rest, and her face was brighter than usual, as she 
said, — 

“ I ’ve never asked after Mrs. Irwine and the Miss Irwines, 
sir ; I hope they ’re as well as usual.” 

“ Yes, thank you, Mrs. Poyser, except that Miss Anne has 
one of her bad headaches to-day By the by, we all liked that 
nice cream-cheese you sent us, — my mother especially.” 

“ I ’m very glad, indeed, sir. It is but seldom I make one, 
but I remembered Mrs. Irwine was fond of ’em. Please give 
my duty to her, and to Miss Kate and Miss Anne. They Ve 
never been to look at my poultry this long while, and I Ve 
got some beautiful speckled chickens, black and white, as 
Miss Kate might like to have some of amongst hers.” 

Well, I ’ll tell her ; she must come and see them. Good- 
by,” said the Rector, mounting his horse. 

Just ride slowly on, Irwine,” said Captain Donnithorne, 
mounting also. '' I ’ll overtake you in three minutes. I ’m 
only going to speak to the shepherd about the whelps. Good- 
by, Mrs. Poyser; tell your husband I shall come and have a 
long talk with him soon.” 


93 


ADAM BEDE 


Mrs. Poyser courtesied duly, and watched the two horses 
until they had disappeared from the yard, amidst great ex- 
citement on the part of the pigs and the poultry, and under 
the furious indignation of the bull-dog, who performed a 
Pyrrhic dance that every moment seemed to threaten the 
breaking of his chain. Mrs. Poyser delighted in this noisy 
exit; it was a fresh assurance to her that the farmyard was 
well guarded, and that no loiterers could enter unobserved; 
and it was not until the gate had closed behind the Captain 
that she turned into the kitchen again, where Dinah stood 
with her bonnet in her hand, waiting to speak to her aunt, 
before she set out for Lisbeth Bede’s cottage. 

Mrs. Poyser, however, though she noticed the bonnet, de- 
ferred remarking on it until she had disburdened herself of 
her surprise at Mr. Irwine’s behaviour. 

Why, Mr. Irwine was n’t angry, then ? What did he say 
to you, Dinah? Didn’t he scold you for preaching? ” 

“ No, he was not at all angry ; he was very friendly to me. 
I was quite drawn out to speak to him ; I hardly know how, 
for I had always thought of him as a worldly Sadducee. But 
his countenance is as pleasant as the morning sunshine.” 

'' Pleasant ! and what else did y’ expect to find him but 
pleasant ? ” said Mrs. Poyser, impatiently, resuming her knit- 
ting. “I should, think his countenance is pleasant indeed! 
and him a gentleman born, and ’s got a mother like a picter. 
You may go the country round, and not find such another 
woman turned sixty-six. It ’s summat-like to see such a man 
as that i’ the desk of a Sunday ! As I say to Poyser, it ’s like 
looking at a full crop o’ wheat, or a pasture with a fine dairy 
o’ cows in it ; it makes you think the world ’s comfortable- 
like. But as for such creatures as you Methodisses run after, 
I ’d as soon go to look at a lot o’ bare-ribbed runts on a com- 
mon. Fine folks they are to tell you what ’s right, as look as 
if they ’d never tasted nothing better than bacon-sword and 
sour-cake i’ their lives. But what did Mr. Irwine say to you 
about that fool’s trick o’ preaching on the Green ? ” 

“ He only said he ’d heard of it ; he did n’t seem to feel any 
displeasure about it. But, dear aunt, don’t think any more 
about that. He told me something that I ’m sure will cause 
you sorrow, as it does me. Thias Bede was drowned last 


94 


A VOCATION 


night in the Willow Brook, and I ’m thinking that the aged 
mother will be greatly in need of comfort. Perhaps I can be 
of use to her, so I have fetched my bonnet and am going to 
set out.” 

” Dear heart, dear heart ! But you must have a cup o’ tea 
first, child,” said Mrs. Poyser, falling at once from the key 
of B with five sharps to the frank and genial C. “ The ket- 
tle ’s boiling, — we ’ll have it ready in a minute ; and the 
young uns ’ull be in and wanting theirs directly. I ’m quite 
willing you should go and see th’old woman, for you .’re one as 
is allays welcome in trouble, Methodist or no Methodist ; but, 
for the matter o’ that, it ’s the fiesh and blood folks are made 
on as makes the difference. Some cheeses are made o’ 
skimmed milk and some o’ new milk, and it ’s no matter what 
you call ’em, you may tell which is which by the look and the 
smell. But as to Thias Bede, he ’s better out o’ the way nor 
in, — God forgi’ me for saying so, — for he ’s done little this 
ten year but make trouble for them as belonged to him ; and 1 
think it ’ud be well for you to take a little bottle o’ rum for 
th’old woman, for I dare say she ’s got never a drop o’ nothing 
to comfort her inside. Sit down, child, and be easy, for you 
sha’n’t stir out till you ’ve had a cup o’ tea, and so I tell you.” 

During the latter part of this speech Mrs. Poyser had been 
reaching down the tea-things from the shelves, and was on 
her way towards the pantry for the loaf (followed close by 
Totty, who had made her appearance on the rattling of the 
teacups), when Hetty came out of the dairy, relieving her 
tired arms by lifting them up, and clasping her hands at the 
back of her head. 

“ Molly,” she said rather languidly, “ just run out and get 
me a bunch of dock-leaves ; the butter ’s ready to pack up 
now.” 

D’ you hear what ’s happened, Hetty? ” said her aunt. 

No; how should I hear anything? ” was the answer, in a 
pettish tone. 

“ Not as you ’d care much, I dare say, if you did hear ; for 
you ’re too feather-headed to mind if everybody was dead, 
so as you could stay upstairs a-dressing yourself for two hours 
by the clock. But anybody beside yourself ’ud mind about 
such things happening to them as think a deal more of you 

95 


ADAM BEDE 


than you deserve. But Adam Bede and all his kin might be 
drownded for what you ’d care, — you ’d be perking at the 
glass the next minute.” 

‘‘Adam Bede — drowned?” said Hetty, letting her arms 
fall and looking rather bewildered, but suspecting that her 
aunt was as usual exaggerating with a didactic purpose. 

“ No, my dear, no,” said Dinah, kindly, — for Mrs. Poyser 
had passed on to the pantry without deigning more precise 
information, — “ not Adam. Adam’s father, the old man, is 
drowned. He was drowned last night in the Willow Brook. 
Mr. Irwine has just told me about it.” 

“ Oh, how dreadful ! ” said Hetty, looking serious but not 
deeply affected ; and as Molly now entered with the dock- 
leaves, she took them silently and returned to the dairy with- 
out asking further questions. 


CHAPTER IX. 

Hetty’s world. 

W HILE she adjusted the broad leaves that set off the 
pale fragrant butter as the primrose is set off by its 
nest of green, I am afraid Hetty was thinking a great deal 
more of the looks Captain Donnithorne had cast at her than 
of Adam and his troubles. Bright, admiring glances from 
a handsome young gentleman, with white hands, a gold 
chain, occasional regimentals, and wealth and grandeur im- 
measurable, — those were the warm rays that set poor 
Hetty’s heart vibrating and playing its little foolish tunes 
over and over again. We do not hear that Memnon’s statue 
gave forth its melody at all under the rushing of the mighti- 
est wind, or in response to any other influence divine or 
human than certain short-lived sunbeams of morning; and 
we must learn to accommodate ourselves to the discovery 
that some of those cunningly fashioned instruments called 
human souls have only a very limited range of music, and 
will not vibrate in the least under a touch that fills others 
with tremulous rapture or quivering agony. 

96 


HETTY’S WORLD 


Hetty was quite used to the thought that peof^le liked 
to look at her. She was riot blind to the fact that young 
Luke Britton of Broxton came to Hayslope Church on a 
Sunday afternoon on purpose that he might see her; and 
that he would have made much more decided advances if 
her uncle Poyser, thinking but lightly of a young man whose 
father’s land was so foul as old Luke Britton’s, had not 
forbidden her aunt to encourage him by any civilities. She 
was aware, too, that Mr. Craig, the gardener at the Chase, 
was over head and ears in love with her, and had lately 
made unmistakable avov/als in luscious strawberries and 
hyperbolical peas. She knew still better, that Adam Bede, 
— tall, upright, clever, brave Adam Bede, — who carried 
such authority with all the people round about, and whom 
her uncle was always delighted to see of an evening, saying 
that “ Adam knew a fine sight more o’ the natur o’ things 
than those as thought themselves his betters,” — she knew 
that this Adam, who was often rather stern to other people, 
and not much given to run after the lasses, could be made 
to turn pale or red any day by a word or a look from her. 
Hetty’s sphere of comparison was not large, but she could n’t 
help perceiving that Adam was “ something like ” a man ; 
always knew what to say about things, could tell her uncle 
how to prop the hovel, and had mended the churn in no 
time ; knew, with only looking at it, the value of the chest- 
nut-tree that was blown down, and why the damp came in 
the walls, and what they must do to stop the rats; and 
wrote a beautiful hand that you could read off, and could do 
figures in his head, — a degree of accomplishment totally 
unknown among the richest farmers of that countryside. 
Not at all like that slouching Luke Britton, who, when she 
once walked with him all the way from Broxton to Hay- 
slope, had only broken silence to remark that the gray goose 
had begun to lay. And as for Mr. Craig, the gardener, he 
was a sensible man enough, to be sure, but he was knock- 
kneed, and had a queer sort of sing-song in his talk ; more- 
over, on the most charitable supposition, he must be far 
on the way to forty. 

Hetty was quite certain her uncle wanted her to encour- 
age Adam, and would be pleased for her to marry him. For 

97 


1 


ADAM BEDE 


those were times when there was no rigid demarcation of 
rank between the farmer and the respectable artisan, and 
on the home hearth as well as in the public house they 
might be seen taking their jug of ale together ; the farmer 
having a latent sense of capital, and of weight in parish 
affairs, which sustained him under his conspicuous inferior- 
ity in conversation. Martin Poyser was not a frequenter of 
public houses, but he liked a friendly chat over his own 
home-brewed; and though it was pleasant to lay down the 
law to a stupid neighbour who had no notion how to make 
the best of his farm, it was also an agreeable variety to learn 
something from a clever fellow like Adam Bede. Accord- 
ingly, for the last three years — ever since he had super- 
intended the building of the new barn — Adam had always 
been made welcome at the Hall Farm, especially of a winter 
evening, when the whole family, in patriarchal fashion, mas- 
ter and mistress, children and servants, were assembled in 
that glorious kitchen, at well-graduated, distances from the 
blazing fire. And for the last two years, at least, Hetty had 
been in the habit of hearing her uncle say, “ Adam Bede 
may be working for wage now, but he dl be a master-man 
some day, as sure as I sit in this chair. Mester Burge is in 
the right on ’t to want him to go partners and marry his 
daughter, if it ’s true what they say ; the woman as marries 
him ’ull have a good take, be ’t Lady Day or Michaelmas,” 
— a remark which Mrs. Poyser always followed up with her 
cordial assent. “ Ah,” she would say, “ it ’s all very fine 
having a ready-made rich man, but may-happen he ’ll be a 
ready-made fool ; and it ’s no use filling your pocket full o’ 
money if you ’ve got a hole in the corner. It ’ll do you no 
good to sit in a spring-cart o’ your own, if you ’ve got a 
soft to drive you : he ’ll soon turn you over into the ditch. 
I allays said I ’d never marry a man as had got no brains ; 
for where ’s the use of a woman having brains of her own 
if she ’s tackled to a geek as everybody ’s a-laughing at ? 
She might as well dress herself fine to sit back’ards on a 
donkey.” 

These expressions, though figurative, sufficiently indicated 
the bent of Mrs. Poyser’s mind with regard to Adam ; and 
though she and her husband might have viewed the subject 

98 


HETTY’S WORLD 


differently if Hetty had been a daughter of their own, it was 
clear that they would have welcomed the match with Adam 
for a penniless niece. For what could Hetty have been but 
a servant elsewhere, if her uncle had not taken her in and 
brought her up as a domestic help to her aunt, whose health 
since the birth of Totty had not been equal to more posi- 
tive labour than the superintendence of servants and chil- 
dren? But Hetty had never given Adam any steady en- 
couragement. Even in the moments when she was most 
thoroughly conscious of his superiority to her other ad- 
mirers, she had never brought herself to think of accepting 
him. She liked to feel that this strong, skilful, keen-eyed 
man was in her power, and would have been indignant if 
he had shown the least sign of slipping from under the yoke 
of her coquettish tyranny, and attaching himself to the gen- 
tle Mary Burge, who would have been grateful enough for 
the most trifling notice from him. “ Mary Burge, indeed ! 
such a sallow-faced girl : if she put on a bit of pink ribbon, 
she looked as yellow as a crow-flower, and her hair was as 
straight as a hank of cotton.” And always when Adam 
stayed away for several weeks from the Hall Farm, and 
otherwise made some show of resistance to his passion as a 
foolish one, Hetty took care to entice him back into the 
net by little airs of meekness and timidity, as if she were in 
trouble at his neglect. But as to marrying Adam, that was 
a very different affair! There was nothing in the world to 
tempt her to do that. Her cheeks never grew a shade deeper 
when his name was mentioned; she felt no thrill when she 
saw him passing along the causeway by the window, or 
advancing towards her unexpectedly in the footpath across 
the meadow; she felt nothing when his eyes rested on her 
but the cold triumph of knowing that he loved her, and 
would not care to look at Mary Burge. He could no more 
stir in her the emotions that make the sweet intoxication 
of young love, than the mere picture of a sun can stir the 
spring sap in the subtle fibres of the plant. She saw him 
as he was, — a poor man, with old parents to keep, who 
would not be able for a long while to come to give her even 
such luxuries as she shared in her uncle’s house. And 
Hetty’s dreams were all of luxuries, — to sit in a carpeted 

99 


ADAM BEDE 


parlour, and always wear white stockings; to have some 
large beautiful ear-rings, such as were all the fashion ; to 
have Nottingham lace round the top of her gown, and some- 
thing to make her handkerchief smell nice, like Miss Lydia 
Donnithorne’s when she drew it out at church ; and not to 
be obliged to get up early or be scolded by anybody. She 
thought, if Adam had been rich and could have given her 
these things, she loved him well enough to marry him. 

But for the last few weeks a new influence had came over 
Hetty, — vague, atmospheric, shaping itself into no self- 
confessed hopes or prospects, but producing a pleasant nar- 
cotic effect, making her tread the ground and go about her 
work in a sort of dream, unconscious of weight or effort, 
and showing her all things through a soft, liquid veil, as if 
she were living not in this solid world of brick and stone, 
but in a beautiful world, such as the sun lights up for us in 
the waters. Hetty had become aware that Mr. Arthur 
Donnithorne would take a good deal of trouble for the 
chance of seeing her; that he always placed himself at 
church so as to have the fullest view of her both sitting and 
standing; that he was constantly finding reasons for call- 
ing at the Hall Farm, and always would contrive to say 
something for the sake of making her speak to him and 
look at him. The poor child no more conceived at present 
the idea that the young squire could ever be her lover, than 
a baker’s pretty daughter in the crowd, whom a young em- 
peror distinguishes by an imperial but admiring smile, con- 
ceives that she shall be made empress. But the baker’s 
daughter goes home and dreams of the handsome young 
emperor, and perhaps weighs the flour amiss while she is 
thinking what a heavenly lot it must be to have him for 
a husband: and so poor Hetty had got a face and a, pres- 
ence haunting her waking and sleeping dreams; bright, 
soft glances had penetrated her, and suffused her life with a 
strange, happy languor. The eyes that shed those glances 
were really not half so fine as Adam’s, which sometimes 
looked at her with a sad, beseeching tenderness; but they 
had found a ready medium in Hetty’s little, silly imagina- 
tion, whereas Adam’s could get no entrance through that 
atmosphere. For three weeks, at least, her inward life had 


loo 


HETTY’S WORLD 


consisted of little else than living through in memory the 
looks and words Arthur had directed towards her, — of lit- 
tle else than recalling the sensations with which she heard 
his voice outside the house, and saw him enter, and became 
conscious that his eyes were fixed on her, and then became 
conscious that a tall figure, looking down on her with eyes 
that seemed to touch her, was coming nearer in clothes of 
beautiful texture, with an odour like that of a flower-garden 
borne on the evening breeze. Foolish thoughts ! But all 
this happened, you must remember, nearly sixty years ago, 
and Hetty was quite uneducated, — a simple farmer’s girl, 
to whom a gentleman with a white hand was dazzling as an 
Olympian god. Until to-day, she had never looked farther 
into the future than to the next time Captain Donnithorne 
would come to the Farm, or the next Sunday when she 
should see him at church; but now she thought, perhaps 
he would try to meet her when she went to the Chase to- 
morrow, — and if he should speak to her, and walk a little 
way, when nobody was by ! That had never happened yet ; 
and now her imagination, instead of retracing the past, was 
busy fashioning what would happen to-morrow, — where- 
about in the Chase she should see him coming towards her, 
how she should put her new rose-coloured ribbon on, which 
he had never seen, and what he would say to her to make 
her return his glance, — a glance which she would be living 
through in her memory, over and over again, all the rest 
of the day. 

In this state of mind how could Hetty give any feeling to 
Adam’s troubles, or think much about poor old Thias being 
drowned? Young souls, in such pleasant delirium as hers, 
are as unsympathetic as butterflies sipping nectar; they 
are isolated from all appeals by a barrier of dreams, — by 
invisible looks and impalpable arms. 

While Hetty’s hands were busy packing up the butter, 
and her head filled with these pictures of the morrow, Ar- 
thur Donnithorne, riding by Mr. Irwine’s side towards the 
valley of the Willow Brook, had also certain indistinct an- 
ticipations, running as an undercurrent in his mind while he 
was listening to Mr. Irwine’s account of Dinah, — indis- 


lOI 


ADAM BEDE 


tinct, yet strong enough to make him feel rather conscious 
when Mr. Irwine suddenly said, — 

‘‘ What fascinated you so in Mrs. Poyser’s dairy, Arthur ? 
Have you become an amateur of damp quarries and skim- 
ming-dishes ? ” 

Arthur knew the Rector too well to suppose that a clever 
invention would be of any use; so he said, with his accus- 
tomed frankness, — 

‘‘No, I went to look at the pretty butter-maker, Hetty 
Sorrel. She 's a perfect Hebe ; and if I were an artist, I 
would paint her. It ’s amazing what pretty girls one sees 
among the farmer’s daughters, when the men are such 
clowns. That common round red face one sees sometimes 
in the men — all cheek and no features, like Martin Poyser’s 
— comes out in the women of the family as the most charm- 
ing phiz imaginable.” 

“ Well, I have no objection to your contemplating Hetty 
in an artistic light, but I must not have you feeding her 
vanity, and filling her little noddle with the notion that she ’s 
a great beauty, attractive to fine gentlemen, or you will 
spoil her for a poor man’s wife, — honest Craig’s, for exam- 
ple, whom I have seen bestowing soft glances on her. The 
little puss seems already to have airs enough to make a hus- 
band as miserable as it ’s a law of nature for a quiet man to 
be when he marries a beauty. Apropos of marrying, I hope 
our friend Adam will get settled, now the poor old man ’s 
gone. He will only have his mother to keep in future, and 
I ’ve a notion that there ’s a kindness between him and that 
nice modest girl, Mary Burge, from something that fell 
from old Jonathan one day when I was talking to him. But 
when I mentioned the subject to Adam he looked uneasy, 
and turned the conversation. I suppose the love-making 
does n’t run smooth, or perhaps Adam hangs back till he ’s 
in a better position. He has independence of spirit enough 
for two men, — rather an excess of pride, if anything.” 

“ That would be a capital match for Adam. He would 
slip into old Burge’s shoes, and make a fine thing of that 
building business, I ’ll answer for him. I should like to see 
him well settled in this parish ; he would be ready then to 
act as my grand- vizier when I wanted one. We could plan 


102 


DINAH VISITS LISBETH 


no end of repairs and improvements together. I Ve never 
seen the girl, though, I think, — at least I Ve never looked 
at her.’’ 

“ Look at her next Sunday at church, — she sits with her 
father on the left of the reading-desk. You need n’t look 
quite so much at Hetty Sorrel then. When I ’ve made up 
my mind that I can’t afford to buy a tempting dog, I take 
no notice of him, because if he took a strong fancy to me 
and looked lovingly at me, the struggle between arithmetic 
and inclination might become unpleasantly severe. I pique 
myself on my wisdom there, Arthur, and as an old fellow to 
whom wisdom has become cheap, I bestow it upon you.” 

Thank you. It may stand me in good stead some day, 
though I don’t know that I have any present use for it. 
Bless me ! how the brook has overflowed ! Suppose we have 
a canter now we ’re at the bottom of the hill.” 

That is the great advantage of dialogue on horseback; 
it can be merged any minute into a trot or a canter, and one 
might have escaped from Socrates himself in the saddle. 
The two friends were free from the necessity of further con- 
versation till they pulled up in the lane behind Adam’s 
cottage. 


CHAPTER X. 


DINAH VISITS LISBETH, 


T five o’clock Lisbeth came downstairs with a large key 



in her hand/: it was the key of the chamber where her 
husband lay dead. Throughout the day, except in her occa- 
sional outbursts of wailing grief, she had been in incessant 
movement, performing the initial duties to her dead with the 
awe and exactitude that belong to religious rites. She had 
brought out her little store of bleached linen, which she had 
for long years kept in reserve for this supreme use. It seemed 
but yesterday, — that time, so many midsummers ago, when 
she had told Thias where this linen lay, that he might be sure 
and reach it out for her when she died, for she was the elder 
of the two. Then there had been the work of cleansing to the 


103 


ADAM BEDE 


strictest purity every object in the sacred chamber, and of re- 
moving from it every trace of common daily occupation. The 
small window which had hitherto freely let in the frosty 
moonlight or the warm summer sunrise on the working man’s 
slumber, must now be darkened with a fair white sheet, for 
this was the sleep which is as sacred under the bare rafters 
as in ceiled houses. Lisbeth had even mended a long-neg- 
lected and unnoticeable rent in the checkered bit of bed-cur- 
tain ; for the moments were few and precious now in which 
she would be able to do the smallest office of respect or love 
for the still corpse, to which in all her thoughts she attributed 
some consciousness. Our dead are never dead to us until we 
have forgotten them: they can be injured by us, they can be 
wounded; they know all our penitence, all our aching sense 
that their place is empty, all the kisses we bestow on the 
smallest relic of their presence. And the aged peasant- woman 
most of all believes that her dead are conscious. Decent 
burial was what Lisbeth had been thinking of for herself 
through years of thrift, with an indistinct expectation that 
she should know when she was being carried to the church- 
yard, followed by her husband and her sons ; and now she felt 
as if the greatest work of her life were to be done in seeing 
that Thias was buried decently before her, — under the white 
thorn, where once, in a dream, she had thought she lay in the 
coffin, yet all the while saw the sunshine above, and smelt the 
white blossoms that were so thick upon the thorn the Sunday 
she went to be churched after Adam was born. 

But now she had done everything that could be done to-day 
in the chamber of death, — had done it all herself, with some 
aid from her sons in lifting, for she would let no one be 
fetched to help her from the village, not being fond of female 
neighbours generally; and her favourite Dolly, the old house- 
keeper at Mr. Burge’s, who had come to condole with her in 
the morning as soon as she heard of Thias’s death, was too 
dim-sighted to be of much use. She had locked the door, and 
now held the key in her hand, as she threw herself wearily 
into a chair that stood out of its place in the middle of the 
house-floor, where in ordinary times she would never have 
consented to sit. The kitchen had had none of her attention 
that day; it was soiled with the tread of muddy shoes, and 

104 


DINAH VISITS LISBETH 


untidy with clothes and other objects out of place. But what 
at another time would have been intolerable to Lisbeth’s 
habits of order and cleanliness seemed to her now just what 
should be : it was right that things should look strange and 
disordered and wretched, now the old man had come to his 
end in that sad way ; the kitchen ought not to look as if noth- 
ing had happened. Adam, overcome with the agitations and 
exertions of the day after his night of hard work, had fallen 
asleep on a bench in the workshop ; and Seth was in the back- 
kitchen making a fire of sticks, that he might get the kettle to 
boil, and persuade his mother to have a cup of tea, — an in- 
dulgence which she rarely allowed herself. 

There was no one in the kitchen when Lisbeth entered and 
threw herself into the chair. She looked round with blank 
eyes at the dirt and confusion on which the bright afternoon’s 
sun shone dismally ; it was all of a piece with the sad confu- 
sion of her mind, — that confusion which belongs to the first 
hours of a sudden sorrow, when the poor human soul is like 
one who has been deposited sleeping among the ruins of a 
vast city, and wakes up in dreary amazement, not knowing 
whether it is the growing or the dying day, — not knowing 
why and whence came this illimitable scene of desolation, or 
why he too finds himself desolate in the midst of it. 

At another time Lisbeth’s first thought would have been, 
“ Where is Adam ? ” but the sudden death of her husband had 
restored him in these hours to that first place in her affections 
which he had held six-and-twenty years ago : she had forgot- 
ten his faults as we forget the sorrows of our departed child- 
hood, and thought of nothing but the young husband’s kind- 
ness and the old man’s patience. Her eyes continued to 
wander blankly, until Seth came in and began to remove 
some of the scattered things, and clear the small round deal 
table, that he might set out his mother’s tea upon it. 

“ What art goin’ to do ? ” she said rather peevishly. 

'' I want thee to have a cup of tea, mother,” answered Seth, 
tenderly. It ’ll do thee good ; and I ’ll put two or three of 
these things awav, and make the house look more comforta- 
ble.” 

'' Comfortable ! How canst talk o’ ma’in’ things comforta- 
ble ? Let a-be, let a-be. There ’s no comfort for me no more,” 

105 


ADAM BEDE 


she went on, the tears coming when she began to speak, “ now 
thy poor feyther ’s gone, an I ’n washed for and mended, an’ 
got ’s victual for him for thirty ’ear, an’ him allays so pleased 
wi’ iverything I done for him, an’ used to be so handy an’ do 
the jobs for me when I war ill an’ cumbered wi’ th’ babby, an’ 
made me the posset an’ brought it upstairs as proud as could 
be, an' carried the lad as war as heavy as two children for 
five mile an’ ne’er grumbled, all the way to Warson Wake, 
’cause I wanted to go an’ see my sister, as war dead an’ gone 
the very next Christmas as e’er come. An’ him to be 
drownded in the brook as we passed o’er the day we war mar- 
ried an’ come home together, an’ he ’d made them lots o’ 
shelves for me to put my plates an’ things on, an’ showed ’em 
me as proud as could be, ’cause he know’d I should be pleased. 
An’ he war to die an’ me not to know, but to be a-sleepin’ i’ 
my bed, as if I caredna nought about it. Eh ! an’ me to live 
to see that ! An’ us as war young folks once, an’ thought we 
should do rarely when we war married. Let a-be, lad, let 
a-be ! I wonna ha’ no tay ; I carena if I ne’er ate nor drink 
no more. When one end o’ th’ bridge tumbles down, where ’s 
th’ use o’ th’ other stannin’ ? I may ’s well die, an’ foller my 
old man. There ’s no knowin’ but he ’ll want me.” 

Here Lisbeth broke from words into moans, swaying her- 
self backwards and forwards on her chair. Seth, always 
timid in his behaviour towards his mother, from the sense 
that he had no influence over her, felt it was useless to at- 
tempt to persuade or soothe her, till this passion was past ; so 
he contented himself with tending the back-kitchen fire, and 
folding up his father’s clothes, which had been hanging out 
to dry since morning; afraid to move about in the room 
where his mother was, lest he should irritate her further. 

But after Lisbeth had been rocking herself and moaning 
for some minutes, she suddenly paused, and said aloud to 
herself, — 

I ’ll go an’ see arter Adam, for I canna think where he ’s 
gotten ; an’ I want him to go upstairs wi’ me afore it ’s dark, 
for the minutes to look at the corpse is like the meltin’ snow.” 

Seth overheard this, and coming into the kitchen again, as 
his mother rose from her chair, he said, — 

Adam ’s asleep in the workshop, mother. Thee ’dst better 

io6 


DINAH VISITS LISBETH 


not wake him. He was o’erwrought with work and trouble.” 

“Wake him? Who’s a-goin’ to wake him? I shanna 
wake him wi’ lookin’ at him. I hanna seen the lad this two 
hour, — I ’d welly forgot as he ’d e’er growed up from a 
babby when ’s feyther carried him.” 

Adam was seated on a rough bench, his head supported by 
his arm, which rested from the shoulder to the elbow on the 
long planing-table in the middle of the workshop. It seemed 
as if he had sat down for a few minutes’ rest, and had fallen 
asleep without slipping from his first attitude of sad, fatigued 
thought. His face, unwashed since yesterday, looked pallid 
and clammy ; his hair was tossed shaggily about his forehead, 
and his closed eyes had the sunken look which follows upon 
watching and sorrow. His brow was knit, and his whole 
face had an expression of weariness and pain. Gyp was evi- 
dently uneasy, for he sat on his haunches, resting his nose on 
his master’s stretched-out leg, and dividing the time between 
licking the hand that hung listlessly down, and glancing with 
a listening air towards the door. The poor dog was hungry 
and restless, but would not leave his master, and was waiting 
impatiently for some change in the scene. It was owing to 
this feeling on Gyp’s part, that when Lisbeth came into the 
workshop, and advanced towards Adam as noiselessly as she 
could, her intention not to awake him was immediately de- 
feated ; for Gyp’s excitement was too great to find vent in 
anything short of a sharp bark, and in a moment Adam 
opened his eyes and saw his mother standing before him. It 
was not very unlike his dream, for his sleep had been little 
more than living through again, in a fevered, delirious way, 
all that had happened since daybreak, and his mother with 
her fretful grief was present to him through it all. The chief 
difference between the reality and the vision was that in his 
dream Hetty was continually coming before him in bodily 
presence, — strangely mingling herself as an actor in scenes 
with which she had nothing to do. She was even by the 
Willow Brook; she made his mother angry by coming into 
the house; and he met her with her smart clothes quite wet 
through, as he walked in the rain to Treddleston, to tell the 
coroner. But wherever Hetty came, his mother was sure to 

107 


ADAM BEDE 


follow soon ; and when he opened his eyes, it was not at all 
startling to see her standing near him. 

“ Eh, my lad, my lad ! ” Lisbeth burst out immediately, her 
wailing impulse returning, for grief in its freshness feels the 
need of associating its loss and its lament with every change 
of scene and incident, “ thee ’st got nobody now but thy old 
mother to torment thee and be a burden to thee: thy poor 
feythur ’ll ne’er anger thee no more ; an’ thy mother may ’s 
well go arter him, — the sooner the better, — for I ’m no 
good to nobody now. One old coat ’ull do to patch another, 
but it ’s good for nought else. Thee ’dst like to ha’ a wife to 
mend thy clothes an’ get thy victual, better nor thy old mother. 
An’ I shall be nought but cumber, a-sittin’ i’ th’ chimney- 
corner.” (Adam winced and moved uneasily; he dreaded, of 
all things, to hear his mother speak of Hetty.) “ But if thy 
feyther had lived, he ’d ne’er ha’ wanted me to go to make 
room for another, for he could no more ha’ done wi’out me 
nor one side o’ the scissars can do wi’out th’ other. Eh, we 
should ha’ been both flung away together, an’ then I shouldna 
ha’ seen this day, an’ one buryin’ ’ud ha’ done for us both.” 

Here Lisbeth paused, but Adam sat in pained silence; he 
could not speak otherwise than tenderly to his mother to-day ; 
but he could not help being irritated by this plaint. It was 
not possible for poor Lisbeth to know how it affected Adam, 
any more than it is possible for a wounded dog to know how 
his moans affect the nerves of his master. Like all complain- 
ing women, she complained in the expectation of being 
soothed ; and when Adam said nothing, she was only prompted 
to complain more bitterly. 

“ I know thee couldst do better wi’out me, for thee couldst 
go where thee likedst, an’ marry them as thee likedst. But I 
donna want to say thee nay, let thee bring home who thee wut ; 
I ’d ne’er open my lips to find faut, for when folks is old an’ 
o’ no use, they may think theirsens well off to get the bit an’ 
the sup, though they ’n to swallow ill words wi’ ’t. An’ if 
thee ’st set thy heart on a lass as ’ll bring thee nought and 
waste all, when thee mightst ha’ them as ’ud make a man on 
thee, I ’ll say nought, now thy feyther ’s dead an’ drownded, 
for I ’m no better nor an old haft when the blade ’s gone.” 

Adam, unable to bear this any longer, rose silently from 

io8 


DINAH VISITS LISBETH 


the bench, and walked out of the workshop into the k. 

But Lisbeth followed him. 

Thee wutna go upstairs an’ see thy feyther then ? I 'u 
done everythin’ now, an’ he ’d like thee to go an’ look at him, 
for he w^ar allays so pleased when thee wast mild to him.” 

Adam turned round at once and said, “Yes, mother, let us 
go upstairs. Come, Seth, let us go together.” 

They went upstairs, and for five minutes all was silence. 
Then the key was turned again, and there was a sound of 
footsteps on the stairs. But Adam did not come down again ; 
he was too weary and worn out to encounter more of his 
mother’s querulous grief, and he went to rest on his bed. 
Lisbeth no sooner entered the kitchen and sat down than she 
threw her apron over her head, and began to cry and moan, 
and rock herself as before. Seth thought, “ She will be 
quieter by and by, now we have been upstairs ; ” and he went 
into the back-kitchen again, to tend his little fire, hoping that 
he should presently induce her to have some tea. 

Lisbeth had been rocking herself in this way for more than 
five minutes, giving a low moan with every forward movement 
of her body, when she suddenly felt a hand placed gently on 
hers, and a sweet treble voice said to her, “ Dear sister, the 
Lord has sent me to see if I can be a comfort to you.” 

Lisbeth paused, in a listening attitude, without removing 
her apron from her face. The voice was strange to her. 
Could it be her sister’s spirit come back to her from the dead 
after all those years ? She trembled, and dared not look. 

Dinah, believing that this pause of wonder was in itself a 
relief for the sorrowing woman, said no more just yet, but 
quietly took off her bonnet, and then, motioning silence to 
Seth, who, on hearing her voice, had come in with a beating 
heart, laid one hand on the back of Lisbeth’s chair, and leaned 
over her, that she might be aware of a friendly presence. 

Slowly Lisbeth drew down her apron, and timidly she 
opened her dim dark eyes. She saw nothing at first but a 
face, — a pure, pale face, with loving gray eyes, and it was 
quite unknown to her. Her wonder increased ; perhaps it was 
an angel. But in the same instant Dinah had laid her hand 
on Lisbeth’s again, and the old woman looked down at it. It 
was a much smaller hand than her own, but it was not white 


109 


ADAM BEDE 


-iicate, for Dinah had never worn a glove in her life, 

. her hand bore the traces of labour from her childhood 
upwards. Lisbeth looked earnestly at the hand for a mo- 
ment, and then, fixing her eyes again on Dinah’s face, said, 
with something of restored courage, but in a tone of sur- 
prise, — 

“ Why, ye ’re a workin’ woman ! ” 

“ Yes, I am Dinah Morris, and I work in the cotton-mill 
when I am at home.” 

“ Ah ! ” said Lisbeth, slowly, still wondering ; “ye corned 
in so light, like the shadow on the wall, an’ spoke i’ my ear, 
as I thought ye might be a sperrit. Ye ’ve got a’most the face 
o’ one as is a-sittin’ on the grave i’ Adam’s new Bible.” 

“ I come from the Hall Farm now. You know Mrs. Poy- 
ser, — she ’s my aunt, and she has heard of your great afflic- 
tion, and is very sorry ; and I ’m come to see if I can be any 
help in your trouble; for I know your sons Adam and Seth, 
and I know you have no daughter ; and when the clergyman 
told me how the hand of God was heavy upon you, my heart 
went out towards you, and I felt a command to come and be 
to you in the place of a daughter in this grief, if you will 
let me.” 

“ Ah ! I know who y’ are now ; y’ are a Methody, like Seth ; 
he ’s tould me on you,” said Lisbeth, fretfully, her overpower- 
ing sense of pain returning, now her wonder was gone. 
“Ye ’ll make it out as trouble ’s a good thing, like he allays 
does. But where’s the use o’ talkin’ to me a-that’n? Ye 
canna make the smart less wi’ talkin’. Ye ’ll ne’er make me 
believe as it ’s better for me not to ha’ my old man die in ’s 
bed, if he must die, an’ ha’ the parson to pray by him, an’ me 
to sit by him, an’ tell him ne’er to mind th’ ill words I ’ve gi’en 
him sometimes when I war angered, an’ to gi’ him a bit an’ a 
sup, as long as a bit an’ a sup he ’d swallow. But eh ! to die 
i’ the cold water an’ us close to him, an’ ne’er to know ; an’ me 
a-sleepin’, as if I ne’er belonged to him no more nor if he ’d 
been a journeyman tramp from nobody knows where ! ” 

Here Lisbeth began to cry and rock herself again; and 
Dinah said, — 

“ Yes, dear friend, your affliction is great. It would be 
hardness of heart to say that your trouble was not heavy to 


no 


DINAH VISITS LISBETH 


bear. God did n’t send me to you to make light of your sor- 
row, but to mourn with you, if you will let me. If you had a 
table spread for a feast, and was making merry with your 
friends, you would think it was kind to let me come and sit 
down and rejoice with you, because you ’d think I should like 
to share those good things; but I should like better to share 
in your trouble and your labour, and it would seem harder 
to me if you denied me that. You won’t send me away? 
You ’re not angry with me for coming? ” 

“Nay, nay; angered! who said I war angered? It war 
good on you to come. An’, Seth, why donna ye get her some 
tay? Ye war in a hurry to get some for me, as had no need, 
but ye donna think o’ gettin’ ’t for them as wants it. Sit ye 
down ; sit ye down. I thank you kindly for cornin’, for it ’s 
little wage ye get by walkin’ through the wet fields to see an 
old woman like me. . . . Nay, I ’n got no daughter o’ my 
own, — ne’er had one, — an’ I warna sorry, for they ’re poor 
queechy things, gells is; I allays wanted to ha’ lads, as could 
fend for theirsens. An’ the lads ’ull be marryin’, — I shall 
ha’ daughters eno’, an’ too many. But now, do ye make the 
tay as ye like it, for I ’n got no taste i’ my mouth this day, — 
it ’s all one what I swaller, — it ’s all got the taste o’ sorrow 
wi’ ’t.” 

Dinah took care not to betray that she had had her tea, and 
accepted Lisbcth’s invitation very readily, for the sake of per- 
suading the old woman herself to take the food and drink she 
so much needed after a day of hard work and fasting. 

Seth was so happy now Dinah was in the house that he 
could not help thinking her presence was worth purchasing 
with a life in which grief incessantly followed upon grief ; 
but the next moment he reproached himself, — it was almost 
as if he were rejoicing in his father’s sad death. Nevertheless 
the joy of being with Dinah would triumph, — it was like the 
influence of climate, which no resistance can overcome; and 
the feeling even suffused itself over his face so as to attract 
his mother’s notice while she was drinking her tea. 

“ Thee may’st well talk o’ trouble bein’ a good thing, Seth, 
for thee thriv’st on ’t. Thee look’st as if thee know’dst no 
more o’ care an’ cumber nor when thee wast a babby a-lyin’ 
awake i’ th’ cradle. For thee ’dst allays lie still wi’ thy eyes 


III 


ADAM BEDE 


open, an’ Adam ne’er ’ud lie still a minute when he wakened. 
Thee wast allays like a bag o’ meal as can ne’er be bruised, — 
though, for the matter o’ that, thy poor feyther war just such 
another. But ye’ve got the same look too” (here Lisbeth 
turned to Dinah). “ I reckon it ’s wi’ bein’ a Methody. Not 
as I ’m a-findin’ faut wi’ ye for ’t, for ye ’ve no call to be fret- 
tin’, an somehow ye looken sorry too. Eh ! well, if the Meth- 
odies are fond o’ trouble, they ’re like to thrive ; it ’s a pity 
they canna ha’ ’t all, an’ take it away from them as donna like 
it. I could ha’ gi’en ’em plenty ; for when I ’d gotten my old 
man, I war worreted from morn till night ; and now he ’s 
gone, I ’d be glad for the worst o’er again.” 

“ Yes,” said Dinah, careful not to oppose any feeling of 
Lisbeth’s; for her reliance, in her smallest words and deeds, 
on a divine guidance always issued in that finest woman’s tact 
which proceeds from acute and ready sympathy, — “ yes ; I 
remember, too, when my dear aunt died, I longed for the 
sound of her bad cough in the nights, instead of the silence 
that came when she was gone. But now, dear friend, drink 
this other cup of tea and eat a little more.” 

"‘What!” said Lisbeth, taking the cup, and speaking in 
a less querulous tone, “ had ye got no feyther and mother, 
then, as ye war so sorry about your aunt?’' 

“ No, I never knew a father or mother ; my aunt brought 
me up from a baby. She had no children, for she was never 
married, and .she brought me up as tenderly as if I ’d been 
her own child.” 

“ Eh, she ’d fine work wi’ ye, I ’ll warrant, bringin’ ye up 
from a babby, an’ her a lone woman, — it ’s ill bringin’ up a 
cade lamb. But I dare say ye warna franzy, for ye look as 
if ye ’d ne’er been angered i’ your life. But what did ye do 
when your aunt died, an’ why didna ye come to live in this 
country, bein’ as Mrs. Poyser ’s your aunt too ? ” 

Dinah, seeing that Lisbeth’s attention was attracted, told 
her the story of her early life, — how she had been brought 
up to work hard, and what sort of place Snowfield was, and 
how many people had a hard life there, — all the details that 
she thought likely to interest Lisbeth. The old woman lis- 
tened, and forgot to be fretful, unconsciously subject to 
the soothing influence of Dinah’s face and voice. After a 


112 


DINAH VISITS LISBETH 


while she was persuaded to let the kitchen be made tidy; 
for Dinah was bent on this, believing that the sense of order 
and quietude around her would help in disposing Lisbeth to 
join in the prayer she longed to pour forth at her side, Seth, 
meanwhile, went out to chop wood ; for he surmised that 
Dinah would like to be left alone with his mother. 

Lisbeth sat watching her as she moved about in her still, 
quick way, and said at last : “Ye Ve got a notion o’ cleanin’ 
up. I wouldna mind ha’in’ ye for a daughter, for ye wouldna 
spend the lad’s wage i’ fine clothes an’ waste. Ye’re not 
like the lasses o’ this country-side. I reckon folks is dif- 
ferent at Snowfield from what they are here.” 

“ They have a different sort of life, many of ’em,” said 
Dinah ; “ they work at different things, — some in the mill, 
and many in the mines, in the villages round about. But 
the heart of man is the same everywhere, and there are the 
children of this world and the children of light there as well 
as elsewhere. But we ’ve many more Methodists there than 
in this country.” 

“ Well, I didna know as the Methody women war like ye, 
for there ’s Will Maskery’s wife, as they say ’s a big Meth- 
ody, isna pleasant to look at at all. I ’d as lief look at a 
tooad. An’ I ’m thinkin’ I wouldna mind if ye ’d stay an’ 
sleep here, for I should like to see ye i’ th’ house i’ th’ 
mornin’. But may-happen they ’ll be lookin’ for ye at Mes- 
ter Poyser’s.” 

“ No,” said Dinah, “ they don’t expect me, and I should 
like to stay, if you ’ll let me.” 

“ Well, there ’s room ; I ’n got my bed laid i’ th’ little 
room o’er the back-kitchen, an’ ye can lie beside me. I ’d 
be glad to ha’ ye wi’ me to speak to i’ th’ night, for ye ’ve 
got a nice way o’ talkin’. It puts me i’ mind o’ the swallows 
as was under the thack last ’ear, when they fust begun to 
sing low an’ softlike i’ th’ mornin’. Eh, but my old man 
war fond o’ them birds ! an’ so war Adam, but they ’n 
ne’er com.ed again this ’ear. Happen they ’re dead too.” 

“ There,” said Dinah, “ now the kitchen looks tidy, and 
now, dear mother, — for I ’m your daughter to-night, you 
know, — I should like you to wash your face and have a 
clean cap on. Do you remember what David did, when God 


ADAM BEDE 


took away his child from him? While the child was yet 
alive he fasted and prayed to God to spare it, and he would 
neither eat nor drink, but lay on the ground all night, be- 
seeching God for the child. But when he knew it was dead, 
he rose up from the ground and washed and anointed 
himself, and changed his clothes, and ate and drank ; and 
when they asked him how it was that he seemed to have 
left off grieving now the child was dead, he said, " While the 
child was yet alive, I fasted and wept ; for I said. Who can 
tell whether God will be gracious to me, that the child may 
live? But now he is dead, wherefore should I fast? can I 
bring him back again? I shall go to him, but he shall not 
return to me.’ ” 

‘‘ Eh, that ’s a true word,” said Lisbeth. Yea, my old 
man wonna come back to me, but I shall go to him, — the 
sooner the better. Well, ye may do as ye like wi’ me: 
there’s a clean cap i’ that drawer, an’ I’ll go i’ the back- 
kitchen, an’ wash my face. An’, Seth, thee may’st reach 
down Adam’s new Bible wi’ th’ picters in, an’ she shall read 
us a chapter. Eh, I like them words, — ‘ I shall go to him, 
but he wonna come back to me.’ ” 

Dinah and Seth were both inwardly offering thanks for 
the greater quietness of spirit that had come over Lisbeth. 
This was what Dinah had been trying to bring about, 
through all her still sympathy and absence from exhorta- 
tion. From her girlhood upwards she had had experience 
among the sick and the mourning, among minds hardened 
and shrivelled through poverty and ignorance, and had 
gained the subtlest perception of the mode in which they 
could best be touched, and softened into willingness to re- 
ceive words of spiritual consolation or warning. As Dinah 
expressed it, “ she was never left to herself ; but it was al- 
ways given her when to keep silence and when to speak.” 
And do we not all agree to call rapid thought and noble im- 
pulse by the name of inspiration? After our subtlest anal- 
ysis of the mental process, we must still say, as Dinah did, 
that our highest thoughts and our best deeds are all given 
to us. 

And so there was earnest prayer, — there was faith, love, 
and hope pouring itself forth that evening in the little kitch- 


IN THE COTTAGE 


en. And poor aged fretful Lisbeth, without grasping any 
distinct idea, without going through any course of religious 
emotions, felt a vague sense of goodness and love, and of 
something right lying underneath and beyond all this sor- 
rowing life. She could n’t understand the sorrow ; but for 
these moments, under the subduing influence of Dinah’s 
spirit, she felt that she must be patient and still. 


CHAPTER XI. 

IN THE COTTAGE. 

I T was but half-past four the next morning, when Dinah, 
tired of lying awake listening to the birds, and watching 
the growing light through the little window in the garret roof, 
rose and began to dress herself very quietly, lest she should 
disturb Lisbeth. But already some one else was astir in the 
house, and had gone downstairs, preceded by Gyp. The 
dog’s pattering step was a sure sign that it was Adam who 
went down ; but Dinah was not aware of this, and she thought 
it was more likely to be Seth, for he had told her how Adam 
had stayed up working the night before. Seth, however, had 
only just awakened at the sound of the opening door. The 
exciting influence of the previous day, heightened at last by 
Dinah’s unexpected presence, had not been counteracted by 
any bodily weariness, for he had not done his ordinary 
amount of hard work ; and so when he went to bed, it was not 
till he had tired himself with hours of tossing wakefulness, 
that drowsiness came, and led on a heavier morning sleep 
than was usual with him. 

But Adam had been refreshed by his long rest, and with 
his habitual impatience of mere passivity, he was eager to 
begin the new day, and subdue sadness by his strong will and 
strong arm. The white mist lay in the valley ; it was going 
to be a bright, warm day, and he would start to work again 
when he had had his breakfast. 

“ There ’s nothing but what ’s bearable as long as a man 
can work,” he said to himself. “ The natur o’ things does n’t 
change, though it seems as if one’s own life was nothing but 

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ADAM BEDE 


change. The square o’ four is sixteen, and you must length- 
en your lever in proportion to your weight, is as true when a 
man ’s miserable as when he ’s happy ; and the best o’ work- 
ing is, it gives you a grip hold o’ things outside vour own 
lot.” 

As he dashed the cold water over his head and face, he felt 
completely himself again ; and with his black eyes as keen as 
ever, and his thick black hair all glistening with the fresh 
moisture, he went into the workshop to look out the wood 
for his father’s coffin, intending that he and Seth should carry 
it with them to Jonathan Burge’s, and have the coffin made 
by one of the workmen there, so that his mother might not see 
and hear the sad task going forward at home. 

He had just gone into the workshop, when his quick ear 
detected a light, rapid foot on the stairs, — certainly not his 
mother’s. He had been in bed and asleep when Dinah had 
come in, in the evening, and now he wondered whose step 
this could be. A foolish thought came, and moved him 
strangely. As if it could be Hetty ! She was the last person 
likely to be in the house. And yet he felt reluctant to go and 
look, and have the clear proof that it was some one else. He 
stood leaning on a plank he had taken hold of, listening to 
sounds which his imagination interpreted for him so pleas- 
antly that the keen, strong face became suffused with a timid 
tenderness. The light footstep moved about the kitchen, fol- 
lowed by the sound of the sweeping-brush, hardly making so 
much noise as the lightest breeze that chases the autumn 
leaves along the dusty path ; and Adam’s imagination saw a 
dimpled face, with dark bright eyes and roguish smiles, look- 
ing backward at this brush, and a rounded figure just leaning 
a little to clasp the handle. A very foolish thought, — it could 
not be Hetty ; but the only way of dismissing such nonsense 
from his head was to go and see who it was, for his fancy only 
got nearer and nearer to belief while he stood there listening. 
He loosed the plank, and went to the kitchen door. 

“ How do you do, Adam Bede ? ” said Dinah, in her calm 
treble, pausing from her sweeping, and fixing her mild, grave 
eyes upon him. “ I trust you feel rested and strengthened 
again to bear the burthen and heat of the day.” 

It was like dreaming of the sunshine and awaking in the 

ii6 


IN THE COTTAGE 


moonlight. Adam had seen Dinah several times, but always 
at the Hall Farm, where he was not very vividly conscious of 
any woman’s presence except Hetty’s ; and he had only in the 
last day or two begun to suspect that Seth was in love with 
her, so that his attention had not hitherto been drawn towards 
her for his brother’s sake. But now her slim figure, her plain 
black gown, and her pale serene face impressed him with ail 
the force that belongs to a reality contrasted with a preoccu- 
pying fancy. For the first moment or two he made no an- 
swer, but looked at her with the concentrated, examining 
glance which a man gives to an object in which he has sud- 
denly begun to be interested. Dinah, for the first time in her 
life, felt a painful self-consciousness ; there was something in 
the dark, penetrating glance of this strong man so different 
from the mildness and timidity of his brother Seth. A faint 
blush came, which deepened as she wondered at it. This 
blush recalled Adam from his forgetfulness. 

I was quite taken by surprise ; it was very good of you to 
come and see my mother in her trouble,” he said, in a gentle, 
grateful tone, for his quick mind told him at once how she 
came to be there. “ I hope my mother was thankful to have 
you,” he added, wondering rather anxiously what had been 
Dinah’s reception. 

“ Yes,” said Dinah, resuming her work, she seemed 
greatly comforted after a while, and she ’s had a good deal of 
rest in the night, by times. She was fast asleep when I left 
her.” 

“Who was it took the news to the Hall Farm?” said 
Adam, his thoughts reverting to some one there; he won- 
dered whether she had felt anything about it. 

“ It was Mr. Irwine, the clergyman, told me ; and my aunt 
was grieved for your mother when she heard it, and wanted 
me to come ; and so is my uncle, I ’m sure, now he ’s heard it, 
but he was gone to Rosseter all yesterday. They ’ll look for 
you there as soon as you ’ve got the time to go, for there ’s no- 
body round that hearth but what ’s glad to see you.” 

Dinah, with her sympathetic divination, knew quite well 
that Adam was longing to hear if Hetty had said anything 
about their trouble; she was too rigorously truthful for be- 
nevolent invention, but she had contrived to say something in 

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ADAM BEDE 


Vv^hich Hetty was tacitly included. Love has a way of cheat- 
ing itself consciously, like a child who plays ^t solitary hide- 
and-seek ; it is pleased with assurances that it all the while 
disbelieves. Adam liked what Dinah had said so much that 
his mind was directly full of the next visit he should pay to 
the Hall Earm, when Hetty would perhaps behave more 
kindly to him than she had ever done before. 

“ But you won’t be there yourself any longer ? ” he said to 
Dinah. 

“No, I go back to Snowfield on Saturday, and I shall have 
to set out to Treddleston early, to be in time for the Oak- 
bourne carrier. So I must go back to the farm to-night, that 
I may have the last day with my aunt and her children. But 
I can stay here all to-day, if your mother would like me ; and 
her heart seemed inclined towards me last night.” 

“ Ah, then, she ’s sure to want you to-day. If mother takes 
to people at the beginning, she ’s sure to get fond of ’em ; but 
she ’s a strange way of not liking young women. Though, to 
be sure,” Adam went on, smiling, “ her not liking other 
young women is no reason why she should n’t like you.” 

Hitherto Gyp had been assisting at this conversation in 
motionless silence, seated on his haunches, and alternately 
looking up in his master’s face to watch its expression, and 
observing Dinah’s movements about the kitchen. The kind 
smile with which Adam uttered the last words was appar- 
ently decisive with Gyp of the light in which the stranger was 
to be regarded; and as she turned round after putting aside 
her sweeping-brush, he trotted towards her, and put up his 
muzzle against her hand in a friendly way. 

“ You see Gyp bids you welcome,” said Adam, “ and he ’s 
very slow to welcome strangers.” 

“ Poor dog ! ” said Dinah, patting the rough gray coat, 
“ I ’ve a strange feeling about the dumb things, as if they 
wanted to speak, and it was a trouble to ’em because they 
could n’t. I can’t help being sorry for the dogs always, 
though perhaps there ’s no need. But they may well have 
more in them than they know how to make us understand, 
for we can’t say half what we feel, with all our words.” 

Seth came down now, and was pleased to find Adam talk- 
ing with Dinah ; he wanted Adam to know how much better 

ii8 


IN THE COTTAGE 


she was than all other women. But after a few words of greet- 
ing, Adam drew him into the workshop to consult about the 
coffin, and Dinah went on with her cleaning. 

By six o’clock they were all at breakfast with Lisbeth in 
a kitchen as clean as she could have made it herself. The 
window and door were open, and the morning air brought 
with it a mingled scent of southernwood, thyme, and sweet- 
brier from the patch of garden by the side of the cottage. 
Dinah did not sit down at first, but moved about, serving the 
others with the warm porridge and the toasted oat-cake, 
which she had got ready in the usual way, for she had asked 
Seth to tell her just what his mother gave them for breakfast. 
Lisbeth had been unusually silent since she came downstairs, 
apparently requiring some time to adjust her ideas to a state 
of things in which she came down like a lady to find all the 
work done, and sat still to be waited on. Her new sensations 
seemed to exclude the remembrance of her grief. At last, 
after tasting the porridge, she broke silence. 

“ Ye might ha’ made the parridge worse,” she said to Di- 
nah ; “ I can ate it wi’out it ’s turnin’ my stomach. It might 
ha’ been a trifle thicker an’ no harm, an’ I allays putten a 
sprig o’ mint in mysen ; but how ’s ye t’ know that ? The lads 
arena like to get folks as ’ll make their parridge as I ’n made 
it for ’em ; it ’s well if they get onybody as ’ll make parridge 
at all. But ye might do, wi’ a bit o’ showin’ ; for ye ’re a stir- 
rin’ body in a mornin’,an’ ye ’ve a light heel, an’ ye ’ve cleaned 
th’ house well enough for a ma’-shift.” 

''Make-shift, mother?” said Adam. "Why, I think the 
house looks beautiful. I don’t know how it could look bet- 
ter.” 

" Thee dostna know ? — nay ; how ’s thee to know ? Th’ 
men ne’er know whether the floor ’s cleaned or cat-licked. 
But thee ’It know when thee gets thy parridge burnt, as it ’s 
like enough to be when I ’m gi’en o’er makin’ it. Thee ’It 
think thy mother war good for summat then.” 

" Dinah,” said Seth, " do come and sit down now and have 
your breakfast. We ’re all served now.” 

" Ay, come an’ sit ye down, — do,” said Lisbeth, " an’ ate a 
morsel ; ye ’d need, arter bein’ upo’ your legs this hour an’ 
half a’ready. Come, then,” she added, in a tone of complain- 

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ADAM BEDE 


ing affection, as Dinah sat down by her side, “ I ’ll be loath 
for ye t’ go, but ye canna stay much longer, I doubt. I could 
put up wi’ ye i’ th’ house better nor wi’ most folks.” 

“ I ’ll stay till to-night if you ’re willing,” said Dinah. “ I ’d 
stay longer, only I ’m going back to Snowfield on Saturday, 
and I must be with my aunt to-morrow.” 

‘‘ Eh, I ’d ne’er go back to that country. My old man come 
from that Stonyshire side, but he left it when he war a young 
un, an’ i’ the right on ’t too ; for he said as there war no wood 
there, an’ it ’ud ha’ been a bad country for a carpenter.” 

“ Ah,” said Adam, “ I remember father telling me when I 
was a little lad, that he made up his mind if ever he moved it 
should be south’ard. But I ’m not so sure about it. Bartle 
Massey says — and he knows the South — as the northern 
men are a finer breed than the southern, harder-headed and 
stronger-bodied, and a deal taller. And then he says, in some 
o’ those countries it ’s as flat as the back o’ your hand, and 
you can see nothing of a distance, without climbing up the 
highest trees. I could n’t abide that: I like to go to work by 
a road that ’ll take me up a bit of a hill, and see the fields for 
miles round me, and a bridge, or a town, or a bit of a steeple 
here and there. It makes you feel the world ’s a big place, an’ 
there ’s other men working in it with their heads and hands 
besides yourself.” 

‘‘ I like th’ hills best,” said Seth, “ when the clouds are over 
your head, and you see the sun shining ever so far off, over 
the Loamford way, as I ’ve often done o’ late, on the stormy 
days : it seems to me as if that was heaven, where there ’s 
always joy and sunshine, though this life ’s dark and cloudy.” 

“ Oh, I love the Stonyshire side,” said Dinah ; I should n’t 
like to set my face towards the countries where they ’re rich 
in corn and cattle, and the ground so level and easy to tread ; 
and to turn my back on the hills where the poor people have 
to live such a hard life, and the men spend their days in the 
mines away from the sunlight. It ’s very blessed on a bleak, 
cold day, when the sky is hanging dark over the hill, to feel 
the love of God in one’s soul, and carry it to the lonely, bare 
stone houses, where there ’s nothing else to give comfort.” 

“ Eh ! ” said Lisbeth, “ that ’s very well for ye to talk, as 
looks welly like the snowdrop-flowers as ha’ lived for days an’ 


120 


IN THE COTTAGE 


days when I ’n gethered ’em, wi’ nothin’ but a drop o’ water 
an’ a peep o’ daylight ; but th’ hungry foulks had better leave 
th’ hungry country. It makes less mouths for the scant cake. 
But,” she went on, looking at Adam, “ donna thee talk o’ 
goin’ south’ard or north’ard, an’ leavin’ thy feyther and moth- 
er i’ the churchyard, an’ goin’ to a country as they know 
nothin’ on. I ’ll ne’er rest i’ my grave if I donna see thee i’ 
the churchyard of a Sunday.” 

Donna fear, mother,” said Adam. ‘‘ If I hadna made up 
my mind not to go, I should ha’ been gone before now,” 

He had finished his breakfast now, and rose as he was 
speaking. 

'' What art goin’ to do ? ” asked Lisbeth. ‘‘ Set about thy 
feyther’s coffin ? ” 

“ No, mother,” said Adam ; we ’re going to take the wood 
to the village, and have it made there.” 

Nay, my lad, nay,” Lisbeth burst out in an eager, wailing 
tone ; “ thee wotna let nobody make thy feyther’s coffin but 
thysen ? Who ’d make it so well ? An’ him as. know’d what 
good work war, an ’s got a son as is the head o’ the village, an’ 
all Treddles’on too, for cleverness.” 

“ Very well, mother, if that ’s thy wish, I ’ll make the 
coffin at home ; but I thought thee wouldstna like to hear the 
work going on.” 

“ An’ why shouldna I like ’t ? It ’s the right thing to be 
done. An’ what ’s liking got to do wi’ ’t ? It ’s choice o’ mis- 
likings is all I ’n got i’ this world. One morsel ’s as good as 
another when our mouth ’s out o’ ta.ste. Thee mun set about 
it now this mornin’, fust thing. I wonna ha’ nobody to touch 
the coffin but thee.” 

Adam’s eyes met Seth’s, which looked from Dinah to him 
rather wistfully. 

“ No, mother,” he said, I ’ll not consent but Seth shall 
have a hand in it too, if it ’s to be done at home. I ’ll go to 
the village this forenoon, because Mr. Burge ’ull want to see 
me, and Seth shall stay at home and begin the coffin. I can 
come back at noon, and then he can go.” 

Nay, nay,” persisted Lisbeth, beginning to cry, “ I ’n set 
my heart on ’t as thee shalt ma’ thy feyther’s coffin. Thee ’t 
so stiff an’ masterful, thee ’t ne’er do as thy mother wants 

I2I 


ADAM BEDE 


thee. Thee wast often angered wi* thy feyther when he war 
alive ; thee must be the better to him now he ’s gone. He ’d 
ha’ thought nothin’ on ’t for Seth to ma’ ’s coffin.” 

Say no more, Adam, say no more,” said Seth, gently, 
though his voice told that he spoke with some effort ; “ moth- 
er ’s in the right. I ’ll go to work, and do thee stay at home.” 

He passed into the workshop immediately, followed by 
Adam ; while Lisbeth, automatically obeying her old habits, 
began to put away the breakfast things, as if she did not mean 
Dinah to take her place any longer. Dinah said nothing, but 
presently used the opportunity of quietly joining the brothers 
in the workshop. 

They had already got on their aprons and paper caps, and 
Adam was standing with his left hand on Seth’s shoulder, 
while he pointed with the hammer in his right to some boards 
which they were looking at. Their backs were turned to- 
wards the door by which Dinah entered, and she came in so 
gently that they were not aware of her presence till they 
heard her voice saying, “ Seth Bede ! ” Seth started, and they 
both turned round. Dinah looked as if she did not see Adam, 
and fixed her eyes on Seth’s face, saying with calm kind- 
ness, — 

I won’t say farewell. I shall see you again when you 
come from work. So as I ’m at the farm before dark, it will 
be quite soon enough.” 

Thank you, Dinah ; I should like to walk home with you 
once more. It ’ll perhaps be the last time.” 

There was a little tremor in Seth’s voice. Dinah put out 
her hand and said, “You ’ll have sweet peace in your mind 
to-day, Seth, for your tenderness and long-suffering towards 
your aged mother.” 

She turned round and left the workshop as quickly and 
quietly as she had entered it. Adam had been observing her 
closely all the while, but she had not looked at him. As soon 
as she was gone, he said, — 

“ I don’t wonder at thee for loving her, Seth. She ’s got a 
face like a lily.” 

Seth’s soul rushed to his eyes and lips: he had never yet 
confessed his secret to Adam, but now he felt a delicious 
sense of disburthenment, as he answered, — 


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IN THE WOOD 


“ Ay, Addy, I do love her, — too much, I doubt. But she 
doesna love me, lad, only as one child o’ God loves another. 
She ’ll never love any man as a husband, — that ’s my belief.” 

” Nay, lad, there s no telling; thee mustna lose heart. She ’s 
made out o’ stuff with a finer grain than most o’ the women ; 
I can see that clear enough. But if she ’s better than they are 
in other things, I canna think she ’ll fall short of ’em in lov- 


ing. 


No more was said. Seth set out to the village, and Adam 
began his work on the coffin. 

” God help the lad, and me too,” he thought, as he lifted 
the board. “ We ’re like enough to find life a tough job, — 
hard work inside and out. It ’s a strange thing to think of a 
man as can lift a chair with his teeth, and walk fifty mile on 
end, trembling and turning hot and cold at only a look from 
one woman out of all the rest i’ the world. It ’s a mystery 
we can give no account of ; but no more we can of the sprout- 
ing o’ the seed, for that matter.” 


CHAPTER XH. 


IN THE WOOD. 



HAT same Thursday morning, as Arthur Donnithorne 


X was moving about in his dressing-room seeing his well- 
looking British person reflected in the old-fashioned mirrors, 
and stared at, from a dingy olive-green piece of tapestry, by 
Pharaoh’s daughter and her maidens, who ought to have 
been minding the infant Moses, he was holding a discussion 
with himself, which, by the time his valet was tying the 
black silk sling over his shoulder, had issued in a distinct 
practical resolution. 

“ I mean to go to Eagledale and fish for a week or so,” 
he said aloud. “ I shall take you with me, Pym, and set off 
this morning; so be ready by half-past eleven.” 

The low whistle which had assisted him in arriving at this 
resolution here broke out into his loudest ringing tenor; 
and the corridor, as he hurried along it, echoed to his fa- 
vourite song from the “ Beggar’s Opera,” — When the 


123 


ADAM BEDE 


heart of a man is oppressed with care.” Not an heroic 
strain; nevertheless Arthur felt himself very heroic as he 
strode towards the stables to give his orders about the 
horses. His own approbation was necessary to him, and it 
was not an approbation to be enjoyed quite gratuitously; 
it must be won by a fair amount of merit. He had never 
yet forfeited that approbation, and he had considerable reli- 
ance on his own virtues. No young man could confess his 
faults more candidly; candour was one of his favourite 
virtues; and how can a man’s candour be seen in all its 
lustre unless he has a few failings to talk of? But he had 
an agreeable confidence that his faults were all of a generous 
kind, — impetuous, warm-blooded, leonine ; never crawling, 
crafty, reptilian. It was not possible for Arthur Donni- 
thorne to do anything mean, dastardly, or cruel. “ No ! 
I ’m a devil of a fellow for getting myself into a hobble, but 
I always take care the load shall fall on my own shoulders.” 
Unhappily there is no inherent poetical justice in hobbles, 
and they will sometimes obstinately refuse to inflict their 
worst consequences on the prime offender, in spite of his 
loudly expressed wish. It was entirely owing to this defi- 
ciency in the scheme of things that Arthur had ever brought 
any one into trouble besides himself. He was nothing, if 
not good-natured ; and all his pictures of the future, when 
he should come into the estate, were made up of a prosper- 
ous, contented tenantry, adoring their landlord, who would 
be the model of an English gentleman, — mansion in first- 
rate order, all elegance and high taste, jolly housekeeping, 
finest stud in Loamshire, purse open to all public objects, — 
in short, everything as different as possible from what was 
now associated with the name of Donnithorne. And one 
of the first good actions he would perform in that future 
should be to increase Irwine’s income for the vicarage of 
Hayslope, so that he might keep a carriage for his mother 
and sisters. His hearty affection for the Rector dated from 
the age of frocks and trousers. It was an affection partly 
filial, partly fraternal, — fraternal enough to make him like 
Irwine’s company better than that of most younger men, 
and filial enough to make him shrink strongly from incur- 
ring Irwine’s disapprobation. 


124 


IN THE WOOD 


You perceive that Arthur Donnithorne was a good fel- 
low,” — all his college friends thought him such : he 
could n’t bear to see any one uncomfortable ; he would have 
been sorry even in his angriest moods for any harm to hap- 
pen to his grandfather ; and his aunt Lydia herself had the 
benefit of that soft-heartedness which he bore towards the 
whole sex. Whether he would have self-mastery enough to 
be always as harmless and purely beneficent as his good- 
nature led him to desire, was a question that no one had 
yet decided against him : he was but twenty-one, you re- 
member ; and we don’t inquire too closely into character in 
the case of a handsome, generous young fellow, who will 
have property enough to support numerous peccadilloes, — 
who, if he should unfortunately break a man’s legs in his 
rash driving, will be able to pension him handsomely; or, 
if he should happen to spoil a woman’s existence for her, 
will make it up to her with expensive bon-bons, packed up 
and directed by his own hand. It would be ridiculous to be 
prying and analytic in such cases, as if one were inquiring 
into the character of a confidential clerk. We use round, 
general, gentlemanly epithets about a young man of birth 
and fortune; and ladies, with that fine intuition which is 
the distinguishing attribute of their sex, see at once that he 
is “ nice.” The chances are that he will go through life 
without scandalizing any one; a seaworthy vessel that no 
one would refuse to insure. Ships, certainly, are liable to 
casualties, which sometimes make terribly evident some flaw 
in their construction, that would never have been discover- 
able in smooth water ; and many a good fellow,” through 
a disastrous combination of circumstances, has undergone a 
like betrayal. 

But we have no fair ground for entertaining unfavour- 
able auguries concerning Arthur Donnithorne, who this 
morning proves himself capable of a prudent resolution 
founded on conscience. One thing is clear: Nature has 
taken care that he shall never go far astray with perfect 
comfort and satisfaction to himself; he will never get be- 
yond that borderland of sin, where he will be perpetually 
harassed by assaults from the other side of the boundary. 

125 


ADAM BEDE 


He will never be a courtier of Vice, and wear her orders in 
his button-hole. 

It was about ten o’clock, and the sun was shining bril- 
liantly; everything was looking lovelier for the yesterday’s 
rain. It is a pleasant thing on such a morning to walk 
along the well-rolled gravel on one’s way to the stables, 
meditating an excursion. But the scent of the stables, which 
in a natural state of things ought to be among the soothing 
influences of a man’s life, always brought with it some irrita- 
tion to Arthur. There was no having his own way in the 
stables ; everything was managed in the stingiest fashion. 
His grandfather persisted in retaining as head groom an old 
dolt whom no sort of lever could move out of his old habits, 
and who was allowed to hire a succession of raw Loam- 
shire lads as his subordinates, one of whom had lately tested 
a new pair of shears by clipping an oblong patch on Ar- 
thur’s bay mare. This state of things is naturally embitter- 
ing; one can put up with annoyances in the house, but to 
have the stable made a scene of vexation and disgust, is a 
point beyond what human flesh and blood can be expected 
to endure long together without danger of misanthropy. 

Old John’s wooden, deep-wrinkled face was the first ob- 
ject that met Arthur’s eyes as he entered the stable-yard, 
and it quite poisoned for him the bark of the two blood- 
hounds that kept watch there. He could never speak quite 
patiently to the old blockhead. 

You must have Meg saddled for me and brought to 
the door at half-past eleven, and I shall want Rattler sad- 
dled for Pym at the same time. Do you hear? ” 

“ Yes, I hear, I hear, Cap’n,” said old John, very delib- 
erately, following the young master into the stable. John 
considered a young master as the natural enemy of an old 
•servant, and young people in general as a poor contrivance 
for carrying on the world. 

Arthur went in for the sake of patting Meg, declining as 
far as possible to see anything in the stables, lest he should 
lose his temper before breakfast. The pretty creature was 
in one of the inner stables, and turned her mild head as her 
master came beside her. Little Trot, a tiny spaniel, her in- 

126 


IN THE WOOD 


separable companion in the stable, was comfortably curled 
up on her back. 

“ Well, Meg, my pretty girl,” said Arthur, patting her 
neck, we ’ll have a glorious canter this morning.” 

“ Nay, your honour, I donna see as that can be,” said 
John. 

“Not be? Why not?” 

“ Why, she ’s got lamed.” 

“ Lamed, confound you ! what do you mean? ” 

“ Why, th’ lad took her too closg to Dalton’s bosses, an’ 
one on ’em flung out at her, an’ she ’s got her shank bruised 
o’ the near fore-leg.” 

The judicious historian abstains from narrating precisely 
what ensued. You understand that there was a great deal of 
strong language, mingled with soothing “ who-ho’s ” while 
the leg was examined; that John stood by with quite as 
much emotion as if he had been a cunningly carved crab- 
tree walking-stick, and that Arthur Donnithorne presently 
repassed the iron gates of the pleasure-ground without sing- 
ing as he went. 

He considered himself thoroughly disappointed and an- 
noyed. There was not another mount in the stable for 
himself and his servant besides Meg and Rattler. It was 
vexatious ; just when he wanted to get out of the way for a 
week or two. It seemed culpable in Providence to allow 
such a combination of circumstances. To be shut up at the 
Chase with a broken arm, when every other fellow in his 
regiment was enjoying himself at Windsor, — shut up with 
his grandfather, who had the same sort of affection for him 
as for his parchment deeds! And to be disgusted at every 
turn with the management of the house and the estate ! In 
such circumstances a man necessarily gets in an ill humour, 
and works off the irritation by some excess or other. “ Sal- 
keld would have drunk a bottle of port every day,” he mut- 
tered to himself ; “ but I ’m not well seasoned enough for 
that. Well, since I can’t go to Eagledale, I ’ll have a gallop 
on Rattler to Norburne this morning, and lunch with Ga- 
waine.” 

Behind this explicit resolution there lay an implicit one. 
If he lunched with Gawaine and lingered chatting, he should 

127 


ADAM BEDE 


not reach the Chase again till nearly five, 'when Hetty would 
be safe out of his sight in the housekeeper’s room ; and 
when she set out to go home, it would be his lazy time after 
dinner, so he should keep out of her way altogether. There 
really would have been no harm in being kind to the little 
thing, and it was worth dancing with a dozen ball-room 
belles only to look at Hetty for half an hour. But perhaps 
he had better not take any more notice of her ; it might put 
notions into her head, as Irwine had hinted ; though Ar- 
thur’ for his part, thought girls were not by any means so 
soft and easily bruised ; indeed, he had generally found them 
twice as cool and cunning as he was himself. As for any 
real harm in Hetty’s case, it was out of the question : Ar- 
thur Donnithorne accepted his own bond for himself with 
perfect confidence. 

So the twelve o’clock sun saw him galloping towards Nor- 
burne; and by good fortune Halsell Common lay in his 
road, and gave him some fine leaps for Rattler. Nothing 
like “ taking ” a few bushes and ditches for exorcising a 
demon ; and it is really astonishing that the Centaurs, with 
their immense advantages in this way, have left so bad a 
reputation in history. 

After this, you will perhaps be surprised to hear that 
although Gawaine was at home, the hand of the dial in 
the courtyard had scarcely cleared the last stroke of three, 
when Arthur returned through the entrance-gates, got down 
from the panting Rattler, and went into the house to take 
a hasty luncheon. But 1 believe there have been men since 
his day who have ridden a long way to avoid a rencontre, 
and then galloped hastily back lest they should miss it. It 
is the favourite stratagem of our passions to sham a retreat, 
and to turn sharp round upon us at the moment we have 
made up our minds that the day is our own. 

“ The Cap’n’s been ridin’ the devil’s own pace,” said Dal- 
ton the coachman, whose person stood out in high relief as 
he smoked his pipe against the stable wall, when John 
brought up Rattler. 

“ An’ I wish he ’d get the devil to do ’s grooming for ’n,” 
growled John. 

“ Ay ; he ’d hev a deal haimabler groom nor what he has 
128 


IN THE WOOD 


now/^ observed Dalton ; and the joke appeared to him so 
good, that, being left alone upon the scene, he continued at 
intervals to take his pipe from his mouth in order to wink 
at an imaginary audience, and shake luxuriously with a si- 
lent, ventral laughter; mentally rehearsing the dialogue 
from the beginning, that he might recite it with effect in the 
servants' hall. 

When Arthur went up to his dressing-room again after 
luncheon, it was inevitable that the debate he had had with 
himself there earlier in the day should flash across his mind ; 
but it was impossible for them now to dwell on the remem- 
brance, — impossible to recall the feelings and reflections 
which had been decisive with him then, any more than to 
recall the peculiar scent of the air that had freshened him 
when he first opened his window. The desire to see Hetty 
had rushed back like an ill-stemmed current ; he was amazed 
himself at the force with which this trivial fancy seemed to 
grasp him : he was even rather tremulous as he brushed 
his hair, — pooh ! it was riding in that break-neck way. It 
was because he had made a serious affair of an idle matter, 
by thinking of it as if it were of any consequence. He would 
amuse himself by seeing Hetty to-day, and get rid of the 
whole thing from his mind. It was all Irwine's fault. “ If 
Irwine had said nothing, I should n't have thought half so 
much of Hetty as of Meg's lameness." However, it was just 
the sort of day for lolling in the Hermitage, and he would 
go and finsh Dr. Moore's “ Zeluco " there before dinner. 
The Hermitage stood in Fir-tree Grove, — the way Hetty 
was sure to come in walking from the Hall Farm. So noth- 
ing could be simpler and more natural ; meeting Hetty was 
a mere circumstance of his walk, not its object. 

Arthur's shadow flitted rather faster among the sturdy 
oaks of the Chase than might have been expected from the 
shadow of a tired man on a warm afternoon, and it was still 
scarcely four o'clock when he stood before the tall narrow 
gate leading into the delicious labyrinthine wood which 
skirted one side of the Chase, and which was called Fir-tree 
Grove, not because the firs were many, but because they 
were few. It was a wood of beeches and limes, with here 
and there a light, silver-stemmed birch, — just the sort of 

129 


9 


ADAM BEDE 


wood most haunted by the nymphs : you see their white 
sunlit limbs gleaming athwart the boughs, or peeping from 
behind the smooth-sweeping outline of a tall lime ; you hear 
their soft liquid laughter, — but if you look with a too 
curious, sacrilegious eye, they vanish behind the silvery 
beeches, they make you believe that their voice was only a 
running brooklet, perhaps they metamorphose themselves 
into a tawny squirrel that scampers away and mocks you 
from the topmost bough. It was not a grove with measured 
grass or rolled gravel for you to tread upon, but with nar- 
row, hollow-shaped, earthy paths, edged with faint dashes 
of delicate moss, — paths which look as if they were made by 
the free-will of the trees and underwood, moving reverently 
aside to look at the tall queen of the white-footed nymphs. 

It was along the broadest of these paths that Arthur 
Donnithorne passed, under an avenue of limes and beeches. 
It was a still afternoon, — the golden light was lingering 
languidly among the upper boughs, only glancing down 
here and there on the purple pathway and its edge of faintly 
sprinkled moss, — an afternoon in which Destiny disguises 
her cold, awful face behind a hazy radiant veil, encloses 
us in warm downy wings, and poisons us with violet-scented 
breath. Arthur strolled along carelessly, with a book under 
his arm, but not looking on the ground as meditative men 
are apt to do; his eyes zvould fix themselves on the distant 
bend in the road round which a little figure must surely 
appear before long. Ah! there she^comes; first a bright 
patch of colour, like a tropic bird among the boughs ; then 
a tripping figure, with a round hat on, and a small basket 
under her arm ; then a deep-blushing, almost frightened, but 
bright-smiling girl, making her courtesy with a fluttered yet 
happy glance, as Arthur came up to her. If Arthur had had 
time to think at all, he would have thought it strange that 
he should feel fluttered too, be conscious of blushing too, — 
in fact, look and feel as foolish as if he had been taken by 
surprise instead of meeting just what he expected. Poor 
things! It was a pity they were not in that golden' age of 
childhood when they would have stood face to face, eying 
each other with timid liking, then given each other a little 
butterfly kiss, and toddled off to play together. Arthur 


130 


IN THE WOOD 


would have gone home to his silk-curtained cot, and Hetty 
to her homespun pillow, and both would have slept without 
dreams, and to-morrow would have been a life hardly con- 
scious of a yesterday. 

Arthur turned round and walked by Hetty’s side without 
giving a reason. They were alone together for the first 
time. What an overpowering presence that first privacy is ! 
He actually dared not look at this little butter-maker for 
the first minute or two. As for Hetty, her feet rested on a 
cloud, and she was borne along by warm zephyrs ; she had 
forgotten her rose-coloured ribbons ; she was no more con- 
scious of her limbs than if her childish soul had passed into 
a water-lily, resting on a liquid bed, and warmed by the 
midsummer sunbeams. It may seem a contradiction, but 
Arthur gathered a certain carelessness and confidence from 
his timidity. It was an entirely different state of mind from 
what he had expected in such a meeting with Hetty; and 
full as he was of vague feeling, there was room, in those 
moments of silence, for the thought that his previous de- 
bates and scruples were needless. 

“ You are quite right to choose this way of coming to the 
Chase,'’ he said at last, looking down at Hetty ; “ it is so 
much prettier as well as shorter than coming by either of 
the lodges.” 

“ Yes, sir,” Hetty answered, with a tremulous, almost 
whispering voice. She did n’t know one bit how to speak to 
a gentleman like Mr. Arthur, and her very vanity made her 
more coy of speech. 

“ Do you come every week to see Mrs. Pomfret? ” 

“Yes, sir, every Thursday, only when she’s got to go 
out with Miss Donnithorne.” 

“ And she ’s teaching you something, is she ? ” 

“ Yes, sir, the lace-mending as she learnt abroad, and 
the stocking-mending, — it looks just like the stocking, you 
can’t tell it ’s been mended ; and she teaches me cutting- 
out too.” 

“ What ! are you going to be a lady’s-maid ? ” 

“ I should like to be one very much indeed.” Hetty 
spoke more audibly now, but still rather tremulously; she 

131 


ADAM BEDE 


thought, perhaps she seemed as stupid to Captain Donni- 
thorne as Luke Britton did to her. 

“ I suppose Mrs. Pomfret always expects you at this 
time? ” 

“ She expects me at four o’clock. I ’m rather late to-day, 
because my aunt could n’t spare me ; but the regular time 
is four, because that gives us time before Miss Donnithorne’s 
bell rings.” 

“ Ah, then, I must not keep you now, else I should like 
to show you the Hermitage. Did you ever see it ? ” 

No, sir.” 

“ This is the walk where we turn up to it. But we must 
not go now. I ’ll show it you some other time, if you ’d like 
to see it.” 

“ Yes, please, sir.” 

“ Do you always come back this way in the evening, or 
are you afraid to come so lonely a road ? ” 

“ Oh, no, sir, it ’s never late ; I always set out by eight 
o’clock, and it ’s so light now in the evening. My aunt 
would be angry with me if I did n’t get home before nine.” 

‘‘ Perhaps Craig, the gardener, comes to take care of 
you ? ” 

A deep blush overspread Hetty’s face and neck. ‘‘ I ’m 
sure he does n’t ; I ’m sure he never did ; I would n’t let 
him; I don’t like him,” she said hastily; and the tears of 
vexation had come so fast that before she had done speak- 
ing a bright drop rolled down her hot cheek. Then she 
felt ashamed to death that she was crying, and for one long 
instant her happiness was all gone. But in the next she 
felt an arm steal round her, and a gentle voice said, — 
Why, Hetty, what makes you cry ? I did n’t mean to 
vex you. I would n’t A^ex you for the world, you little 
blossom. Come, don’t cry ; look at me, else I shall think 
you won’t forgive me.” 

Arthur had laid his hand on the soft arm that was nearest 
to him, and was stooping towards Hetty with a look of 
coaxing entreaty. Hetty lifted her long, dewy lashes, and 
met the eyes that were bent towards her with a sweet, timid, 
beseeching look. What a space of time those three mo- 
ments were, while their eyes met and his arms touched her ! 


132 


IN THE WOOD 


Love is such a simple thing when we have only one-and- 
twenty summers and a sweet girl of seventeen trembles 
under our glance, as if she were a bud first opening her heart 
with wondering rapture to the morning. Such young, un- 
furrowed souls roll to meet each other like two velvet 
peaches that touch softly and are at rest; they mingle as 
easily as two brooklets that ask for nothing but to entwine 
themselves and ripple with ever-interlacing curves in the 
leafiest hiding-places. While Arthur gazed into Hetty’s 
dark, beseeching eyes, it made no difference to him what 
sort of English she spoke ; and even if hoops and powder 
had been in fashion, he would very likely not have been 
sensible just then that Hetty wanted those signs of high 
breeding. 

But they started asunder with beating hearts : something 
had fallen on the ground with a rattling noise. It was 
Hetty’s basket ; all her little work-woman’s matters were 
scattered on the path, some of them showing a capability of 
rolling to great lengths. There was much to be done in 
picking up, and not a word was spoken ; but when Arthur 
hung the basket over her arm again, the poor child felt a 
strange difference in his look and manner. He just pressed 
her hand, and said, with a look and tone that were almost 
chilling to her, — 

“ I have been hindering you ; I must not keep you any 
longer now. You will be expected at the house. Good-by.” 

Without waiting for her to speak, he turned away from 
her and hurried back towards the road that led to the Her- 
mitage, leaving Hetty to pursue her way in a strange dream, 
that seemed to have begun in bewildering delight, and was 
now passing into contrarieties and sadness. Would he meet 
her again as she came home? Why had he spoken almost 
as if he were displeased with her, and then run away so 
suddenly? She cried, hardly knowing why. 

Arthur too was very uneasy, but his feelings were lit up 
for him by a more distinct consciousness. He hurried to the 
Hermitage, which stood in the heart of the wood, unlocked 
the door with a hasty wrench, slammed it after him, pitched 
Zeluco ” into the most distant corner, and thrusting his 
right hand into his pocket, first walked four or five times up 

133 


ADAM BEDE 


and down the scanty length of the little room, and then 
seated himself on the ottoman in an uncomfortable, stiff 
way, as we often do when we wish not to abandon ourselves 
to feeling. 

He was getting in love with Hetty, — that was quite plain. 
He was ready to pitch everything else — no matter where — 
for the sake of surrendering himself to this delicious feeling 
which had just disclosed itself. It was no use blinking the 
fact now, — they would get too fond of each other, if he 
went on taking notice of her; and what would come of it? 
He should have to go away in a few weeks, and the poor 
little thing would be miserable. He must not see her alone 
again ; he must keep out of her way. What a fool he was 
for coming back from Gawaine’s! 

He got up and threw open the windows, to let in the soft 
breath of the afternoon, and the healthy scent of the firs that 
made a belt round the Hermitage. The soft air did not 
help his resolutions, as he leaned out and looked into the 
leafy distance. But he considered his resolution sufficiently 
fixed ; there was no need to debate with himself any longer. 
He had made up his mind not to meet Hetty again ; and 
now he might give himself up to thinking how immensely 
agreeable it would be if circumstances were different, — how 
pleasant it would have been to meet her this evening as she 
came back, and put his arm round her again and look into 
her sweet face. He wondered if the dear little thing were 
thinking of him too, — twenty to one she was. How beauti- 
ful her eyes were with the tear on their lashes! He would 
like to satisfy his soul for a day with looking at them, and 
he must see her again, — he must see he|*, simply to remove 
any false impression from her mind about his manner to her 
just now. He would behave in a quiet, kind way to her, — 
just to prevent her from going home with her head full of 
wrong kncies. Yes, that would be the best thing to do, 
after all. 

It ^was a long while — more than an hour — before Ar- 
thur had brought his meditations to this point ; but once 
arrived there, he could stay no longer at the Hermitage. 
The time must be filled up with movement until he should 


134 


EVENING IN THE WOOD 


see Hetty again. And it was already late enough to go 
and dress for dinner, for his grandfather’s dinner-hour was 
six. 


CHAPTER XHI. 

EVENING IN THE WOOD. 

I T happened that Mrs. Pomfret had had a slight quarrel 
with Mrs. Best, the housekeeper, on this Thursday morn- 
ing, — a fact which had two consequences highly convenient 
to Hetty. It caused Mrs. Pomfret to have tea sent up to her 
own room, and it inspired that exemplary lady’s-maid with 
so lively a recollection of former passages in Mrs. Best’s con- 
duct, and of dialogues in which Mrs. Best had decidedly the 
inferiority as an interlocutor with Mrs. Pomfret, that Hetty 
required no more presence of mind than was demanded for 
using her needle, and throwing in an occasional “ yes ” or 
“no.” She would have wanted to put on her hat earlier than 
usual ; only she had told Captain Donnithorne that she usu- 
ally set out about eight o’clock, and if he should go to the 
Grove again expecting to see her, and she should be gone! 
Would he come? Her little butterfly-soul fluttered incessant- 
ly between memory and dubious expectation. At last the 
minute-hand of the old-fashioned brazen-faced timepiece was 
on the last quarter to eight, and there was every reason for 
its being time to get ready for departure. Even Mrs. Pom- 
fret’s preoccupied mind did not prevent her from noticing 
what looked like a new flush of beauty in the little thing as she 
tied on her hat before the looking-glass. 

“ That child gets prettier and prettier every day, I do be- 
lieve,” was her inward comment. “ The more ’s the pity. 
She ’ll get neither a place nor a husband any the sooner for 
it. Sober well-to-do men don’t like such pretty wives. When 
I was a girl, I was more admired than if I had been so very 
pretty. However, she ’s reason to be grateful to me for teach- 
ing her something to get her bread with, better than farm- 
house work. They always told me I was good-natured, — 
and that ’s the truth, and to my hurt too, else there ’s them in 

1.35 


ADAM BEDE 


this house that would n’t be here now to lord it over me in 
the housekeeper’s room.” 

Hetty walked hastily across the short space of pleasure- 
ground which she had to traverse, dreading to meet Mr. 
Craig, to whom she could hardly have spoken civilly. How 
relieved she was when she had got safely under the oaks and 
among the fern of the Chase ! Even then she was as ready to 
be startled as the deer that leaped away at her approach. She 
thought nothing of the evening light that lay gently in the 
grassy alleys between the fern, and made the beauty of their 
living green more visible than it had been in the overpower- 
ing flood of noon; she thought of nothing that was present. 
She only saw something that was possible, — Mr. Arthur 
Donnithorne coming to meet her again along the Fir-tree 
Grove. That was the foreground of Hetty’s picture; behind 
it lay a bright, hazy something, — days that were not to be as 
the other days of her life had been. It was as if she had been 
wooed by a river-god, who might any time take her to his 
wondrous halls below a watery heaven. There was no know- 
ing what would come, since this strange, entrancing delight 
had come. If a chest full of lace and satin and jewels had 
been sent her from some unknown source, how could she but 
have thought that her whole lot was going to change, and that 
to-morrow some still more bewildering joy would befall her? 
Hetty had never read a novel; if she had ever seen one, I 
think the words would have been too hard for her ; how then 
could she find a shape for her expectations? They were as 
formless as the sweet languid odours of the garden at the 
Chase, which had floated past her as she walked by the gate. 

She is at another gate now, — that leading into Fir-tree 
Grove. She enters the wood, where it is already twilight ; and 
at every step she takes, the fear at her heart becomes colder. 
If he should not come ! Oh, how dreary it was, — the 
thought of going out at the other end of the wood, into the 
unsheltered road, without having seen him. She reaches the 
first turning towards the Hermitage, walking slowly, — he is 
not there. She hates the leveret that runs across the path; 
she hates everything that is not what she longs for. She walks 
on, happy whenever she is coming to a bend in the road, for 
perhaps he is behind it. No. She is beginning to cry : her 

136 


EVENING IN THE WOOD 


heart has swelled so, the tears stand in her eyes ; she gives one 
great sob, while the corners of her mouth quiver, and the 
tears roll down. 

She does n’t know that there is another turning to the Her- 
mitage, that she is close against it, and that Arthur Donni- 
thorne is only a few yards from her, full of one thought, and 
a thought of which she only is the object. He is going to see 
Hetty again; that is the longing which has been growing 
through the last three hours to a feverish thirst. Not, of 
course, to speak in the caressing way into which he had un- 
guardedly fallen before dinner, but to set things right with 
her by a kindness which would have the air of friendly civility, 
and prevent her from running away with wrong notions about 
their mutual relation. 

If Hetty had known he was there, she would not have cried ; 
and it would have been better, for then Arthur would perhaps 
have behaved as wisely as he had intended. As it was, she 
started when he appeared at the end of the side-alley, and 
looked up at him with two great drops rolling down her 
cheeks. What else could he do but speak to her in a soft, 
soothing tone, as if she were a bright-eyed spaniel with a 
thorn in her foot ? 

“ Has something frightened you, Hetty ? Have you seen 
anything in the wood ? Don’t be frightened, — I ’ll take care 
of you now.” 

Hetty was blushing so, she did n’t know whether she was 
happy or miserable. To be crying again, — what did gentle- 
men think of girls who cried in that way? She felt unable 
even to say “ no,” but could only look away from him, and 
wipe the tears from her cheek. Not before a great drop had 
fallen on her rose-coloured strings; she knew that quite well. 

'' Come, be cheerful again. Smile at me, and tell me what ’s 
the matter. Come, tell me.” 

Hetty turned her head towards him, whispered, “ I 
thought you would n’t come,” and slowly got courage to lift 
her eyes to him. That look was too much ; he must have had 
eyes of Egyptian granite not to look too lovingly in return. 

“You little frightened bird! little tearful rose! silly pet! 
You won’t cry again, now I ’m with you, will you? ” 

Ah, he does n’t know in the least what he is saying. This 

137 


ADAM BEDE 


is not what he meant to say. His arm is stealing round' the 
waist again, it is tightening its clasp ; he is bending his face 
nearer and nearer to the round cheek, his lips are meeting 
those pouting child-lips, and for a long moment time has 
vanished. He may be a shepherd in Arcadia, for aught he 
knows ; he may be the first youth kissing the first maiden ; 
he may be Eros himself, sipping the lips of Psyche, — it is 
all one. 

There was no speaking for minutes after. They walked 
along with beating hearts till they came within sight of the 
gate at the end of the wood. Then they looked at each other, 
not quite as they had looked before, for in their eyes there 
was the memory of a kiss. 

But already something bitter had begun to mingle itself 
with the fountain of sweets ; already Arthur was uncomfort- 
able. He took his arm from Hetty’s waist, and said, — 

“ Here we are, almost at the end of the grove. I wonder 
how late it is,” he added, pulling out his watch. “ Twenty 
minutes past eight, — but my watch is too fast. However, 
I ’d better not go any farther now. Trot along quickly with 
your little feet, and get home safely. Good-by.” 

He took her hand, and looked at her half sadly, half with 
a constrained smile. Hetty’s eyes seemed to beseech him not 
to go away yet ; but he patted her cheek, and said Good-by ” 
again. She was obliged to turn away from him, and go on. 

As for Arthur, he rushed back through the wood, as if he 
wanted to put a wide space between himself and Hetty. He 
would not go to the Hermitage again ; he remembered how he 
had debated with himself there before dinner, and it had all 
come to nothing, — worse than nothing. He walked right 
on into the Chase, glad to get out of the Grove, which surely 
was haunted by his evil genius. Those beeches and smooth 
lines, — there was something enervating in the very sight of 
them; but the strong knotted old oaks had no bending lan- 
guor in them, — the sight of them would give a man some 
energy. Arthur lost himself among the narrow openings in 
the fern, winding about without seeking any issue, till the twi- 
light deepened almost to night under the great boughs, and 
the hare looked black as it darted across his path. 

He was feeling much more strongly than he had done in 

138 


EVENING IN THE WOOD 


the morning ; it was as if his horse had wheeled round from a 
leap, and dared to dispute his mastery. He was dissatisfied 
with himself, irritated, mortified. He no sooner fixed his 
mind on the probable consequences of giving way to the emo- 
tions which had stolen over him to-day — of continuing to 
notice Hetty, of allowing himself any opportunity for such 
slight caresses as he had been betrayed into already — than 
he refused to believe such a future possible for himself. To 
flirt with Hetty was a very different affair from flirting with 
a pretty girl of his own station : that was understood to be an 
amusement on both sides ; or, if it became serious, there was 
no obstacle to marriage. But this little thing would be spoken 
ill of directly, if she happened to be seen walking with him; 
and then those excellent people, the Poysers, to whom a 
good name was as precious as if they had the best blood in 
the land in their veins, — he should hate himself if he made 
a scandal of that sort, on the estate that was to be his own 
some day, and among tenants by whom he liked, above all, 
to be respected. He could no more believe that he should 
so fall in his own esteem than that he should break both 
legs and go on crutches all the rest of his life. He could n’t 
imagine himself in that position ; it was too odious, too un- 
like him. 

And even if no one knew anything about it, they might get 
too fond of each other, and then there could be nothing but 
the misery of parting, after all. No gentleman, out of a bal- 
lad, could marry a farmer’s niece. There must be an end to 
the whole thing at once ; it was too foolish. 

And yet he had been so determined this morning, before 
he went to Gawaine’s ; and while he was there something had 
taken hold of him and made him gallop back. It seemed he 
could n’t quite depend on his own resolution, as he had 
thought he could ; he almost wished his arm would get pain- 
ful again, and then he should think of nothing but the comfort 
it would be to get rid of the pain. There was no knowing 
what impulse might seize him to-morrow, in this confounded 
place, where there was nothing to occupy him imperiously 
through the livelong day. What could he do to secure him- 
self from any more of this folly? 

There was but one resource. He would go and tell Irwine, 


139 


ADAM BEDE 


— tell him everything. The mere act of telling it would make 
it seem trivial ; the temptation would vanish, as the charm of 
fond words vanishes when one repeats them to the indifferent. 
In every way it would help him, to tell Irwine. He would 
ride to Broxton Rectory the first thing after breakfast to-mor- 
row. 

Arthur had no sooner come to this determination than he 
began to think which of the paths would lead him home, 
and made as short a walk thither as he could. He felt sure 
he should sleep now; he had had enough to tire him, and 
there was no more need for him to think. 


CHAPTER XIV. 


THE RETURN HOME. 


HILE that parting in the wood was happening, there 



VV was a parting in the cottage too, and Lisbeth had 
stood with Adam at the door, straining her aged eyes to 
get the last glimpse of Seth and Dinah, as they mounted 
the opposite slope. 

“ Eh, I ’m loath to see the last on her,” she said to Adam, 
as they turned into the house again. “ I ’d ha’ been willin’ 
t’ ha’ her about me till I died and went to lie by my old 
man. She ’d make it easier dyin,’ — she spakes so gentle 
an’ moves about so still. I could be fast sure that pictur 
was drawed for her i’ thy new Bible, — th’ angel a-sittin’ 
on the big stone by the grave. Eh, I wouldna mind ha’in’ 
a daughter like that ; but nobody ne’er marries them as is 
good for aught.” 

“ Well, mother, I hope thee wilt have her for a daughter ; 
for Seth ’s got a liking for her, and I hope she ’ll get a lik- 
ing for Seth in time.” 

“ Where ’s th’ use o’ talkin’ a-that’n ? She caresna for 
Seth. She ’s goin’ away twenty mile aff. How ’s she to 
get a likin’ for him, I ’d like to know? No more nor the 
cake ’ull come wi’out the leaven. Thy figurin’ books might 
ha’ tould thee better nor that, I should think, else thee 
mightst as well read the commin print, as Seth allays does.” 


140 


THE RETURN HOME 


Nay, mother,’’ said Adam, laughing, the figures tell 
us a fine deal, and we could n’t go far without ’em, but they 
don’t tell us about folks’s feelings. It ’s a nicer job to cal- 
culate them. But Seth ’s as good-hearted a lad as ever han- 
dled a tool, and plenty o’ sense, and good-looking too ; and 
he ’s got the same way o’ thinking as Dinah. He deserves 
to win her, though there ’s no denying she ’s a rare bit o’ 
workmanship. You don’t see such women turned off the 
wheel every day.” 

Eh, thee ’t allays stick up for thy brother. Thee ’st 
been just the same e’er sin’ ye war little uns together. Thee 
wart allavs for halving iverything wi’ him. But what ’s 
Seth got to do with marryin’, as is on’y three-an’-twenty ? 
He ’d more need to learn an’ lay by sixpence. An’ as for 
his desarving her, — she ’s two ’ear older nor Seth : she ’s 
pretty near as old as thee. But that ’s the way ; folks mun 
allays choose by contrairies, as if they must be sorted like 
the pork, — a bit o’ good meat wi’ a bit o’ offal.” 

To the feminine mind in some of its moods, all things 
that might be receive a temporary charm from comparison 
with what is ; and since Adam did not want to marry Dinah 
himself, Lisbeth felt rather peevish on that score, — as peev- 
ish as she would have been if he had wanted to marry her, 
and so shut himself out from Mary Burge and the partner- 
ship as effectually as by marrying Hetty. 

It was more than half-past eight when Adam and his 
mother were talking in this way, so that when, about ten 
minutes later, Hetty reached the turning of the lane that 
led to the farmyard gate, she saw Dinah and Seth approach- 
ing it from the opposite direction, and waited for them to 
come up to her. They too, like Hetty, had lingered a little 
in their walk, for Dinah was trying to speak words of com- 
fort and strength to Seth in these parting moments. But 
when they saw Hetty, they paused and shook hands; Seth 
turned homewards, and Dinah came on alone. 

“ Seth Bede would have come and spoken to you, my 
dear,” she said, as she reached Hetty, but he ’s very full 
of trouble to-riight.” 

Hetty answered with a dimpled smile, as if she did not 
quite know what had been said ; and it made a strange con- 

141 


ADAM BEDE 


trast to see that sparkling, self-engrossed loveliness looked 
at by Dinah’s calm, pitying face, with its open glance which 
told that her heart lived in no cherished secrets of its own, 
but in feelings which it longed to share with all the world. 
Hetty liked Dinah as well as she had ever liked any woman ; 
how was it possible to feel otherwise towards one who al- 
ways put in a kind word for her when her aunt was finding 
fault, and who was always ready to take Totty off her 
hands, — little, tiresome Totty, that was made such a pet 
of by every one, and that Hetty could see no interest in 
at all? Dinah had never said anything disapproving or 
reproachful to Hetty during her whole visit to the Hall 
Farm ; she had talked to her a great deal in a serious way, 
but Hetty did n’t mind that much, for she never listened. 
Whatever Dinah might say, she almost always stroked 
Hetty’s cheek after it, and wanted to do some mending for 
her. Dinah was a riddle to her. Hetty looked at her 
much in the same way as one might imagine a little, 
perching bird that could only flutter from bough to bough, 
to look at the swoop of the swallow or the mounting of the 
lark ; but she did not care to solve such riddles, any more 
than she cared to know what was meant by the pictures in 
the Pilgrim’s Progress,’' or in the old folio Bible that 
Marty and Tommy always plagued her about on a Sunday. 

Dinah took her hand now, and drew it under her own 
arm. 

“ You look very happy to-night, dear child,” she said. 
“ I shall think of you often when I ’m at Snowfield, and 
see your face before me as it is now. It ’s a strange thing, 
— sometimes when I ’m quite alone, sitting in my room with 
my eyes closed, or walking over the hills, the people I ’ve 
seen and known, if it ’s only been for a few days, are brought 
before me, and I hear their voices and see them look and 
move almost plainer than I ever did when they were really 
with me so as I could touch them. And then my heart is 
drawn out towards them, and I feel their lot as if it was my 
own, and I take comfort in spreading it before the Lord and 
resting in his love, on their behalf as well as my own. And 
so I feel sure you will come before me.” 

She paused a moment, but Hetty -said nothing. 

142 


THE RETURN HOME 


“ It has been a very precious time to me,” Dinah went on, 
“ last night and to-day, — seeing two such good sons as 
Adam and Seth Bede. They are so tender and thoughtful 
for their aged mother. And she has been telling me what 
Adam has done, for these many years, to help his father 
and his brother ; it ’s wonderful what a spirit of wisdom 
and knowledge he has, and how he ’s ready to use it all in 
behalf of them that are feeble. And I ’m sure he has a lov- 
ing spirit too. I Ve noticed it often among my own people 
round Snowfield, that the strong, skilful men are often the 
gentlest to the women and children ; and it ’s pretty to see 
’em carrying the little babies as if they were no heavier 
than little birds. And the babies always seem to like the 
strong arm best. I feel sure it would be so with Adam Bede. 
Don’t you think so, Hetty ? ” 

“ Yes,” said Hetty, abstractedly, for her mind had been 
all the while in the wood, and she would have found it dif- 
ficult to say what she was assenting to. Dinah saw she was 
not inclined to talk, but there would not have been time to 
say much more, for they were now at the yard-gate. 

The still twilight, with its dying western red, and its few 
faint struggling stars, rested on the farmyard, where there 
was not a sound to be heard but the stamping of the cart- 
horses in the stable. It was about twenty minutes after 
sunset ; the fowls were all gone to roost, and the bull-dog 
lay stretched on the straw outside his kennel, with the 
black-and-tan terrier by his side, when the falling to of 
the gate disturbed them, and set them barking, like good 
officials, before they had any distinct knowledge of the 
reason. 

The barking had its effect in the house, for, as Dinah 
and Hetty approached, the doorway was filled by a portly 
figure, with a ruddy black-eyed face, which bore in it the 
possibility of looking extremely acute and occasionally con- 
temptuous on market-days, but had now a predominant 
after-supper expression of hearty good-nature. It is well 
known that great scholars who have shown the most pitiless 
acerbity in their criticism of other men’s scholarship have 
yet been of a relenting and indulgent temper in private life ; 
and I have heard of a learned man meekly rocking the 

143 


ADAM BEDE 


twins in the cradle with his left hand, while with his right he 
inflicted the most lacerating sarcasms on an opponent who 
had betrayed a brutal ignorance of Hebrew. Weaknesses 
and errors must be forgiven, — alas ! they are not alien to 
us, — but the man who takes the wrong side on the mo- 
mentous subject of the Hebrew points must be treated as 
the enemy of his race. There was the same sort of anti- 
thetic mixture in Martin Poyser: he was of so excellent a 
disposition that he had been kinder and more respectful 
than ever to his old father since he had made a deed of gift 
of all his property, and no man judged his neighbours more 
charitably on all personal matters; but for a farmer, like 
Luke Britton, for example, whose fallows were not well 
cleaned, who did n’t know the rudiments of hedging and 
ditching, and showed but a small share of judgment in the 
purchase of winter stock, Martin Poyser was as hard and 
implacable as the northeast wind. Luke Britton could not 
make a remark, even on the weather, but Martin Poyser 
detected in it a taint of that unsoundness and general ig- 
norance which was palpable in all his farming operations. 
He hated to see the fellow lift the pewter pint to his mouth 
in the bar of the Royal George on market-day; and the 
mere sight of him on the other side of the road brought a 
severe and critical expression into his black eyes, as dift'erent 
as possible from the fatherly glance he bent on his two nieces 
as they approached the door. Mr. Poyser had smoked his 
evening pipe, and now held his hands in his pockets, as the 
only resource of a man who continues to sit up after the 
day’s business is done. 

“ Why, lasses, ye ’re rather to-night,” he said, when they 
reached the little gate leading into the causeway. “ The 
mother’s begun to fidget about you, an’ she ’s got the little 
un ill. An’ how did you leave the old woman Bede, Dinah ? 
Is she much down about the old man? He’d been but a 
poor bargain to her this five year.” 

“ She ’s been greatly distressed for the loss of him,” said 
Dinah ; “ but she ’s seemed more comforted to-day. Her 
son Adam ’s been at home all day, working at his father’s 
coffin, and she loves to have him at home. She ’s been 
talking about him to me almost all the day. She has a 


144 


THE RETURN HOME 


loving heart, though she ’s sorely given to fret and be fear- 
ful. I wish she had a surer trust to comfort her in her old 
age.’’ 

Adam ’s sure enough,” said Mr. Poyser, misunderstand- 
ing Dinah’s wish. “ There ’s no fear but he ’ll yield well i’ 
the threshing. He ’s not one o’ them as is all straw and no 
grain. I ’ll be bond for him any day, as he ’ll be a good son 
to the last. Did he say he ’d be coming to see us soon ? 
But come in, come in,” he added, making way for them ; 
“ I had n’t need keep y’ out any longer.” 

The tall buildings round the yard shut out a good deal of 
the sky, but the large window let in abundant light to show 
every corner of the houseplace. 

Mrs. Poyser, seated in the rocking-chair, which had been 
brought out of the “ right-hand parlour,” was trying to 
soothe Totty to sleep. But Totty was not disposed to sleep ; 
and when her cousins entered, she raised herself up, and 
showed a pair of flushed cheeks, which looked fatter than 
ever now they were defined by the edge of her linen night- 
cap. 

In the large wicker-bottomed arm-chair in the left-hand 
chimney-nook sat old Martin Poyser, a hale but shrunken 
and bleached image of his portly black-haired son, — his 
head hanging forward a little, and his elbows pushed back- 
wards so as to allow the whole of his fore-arm to rest on 
the arm of the chair. His blue handkerchief was spread 
over his knees, as was usual indoors, when it was not hang- 
ing over his head ; and he sat watching what went forward 
with the quiet outward glance of healthy old age, which, 
disengaged from any interest in an inward drama, spies out 
pins upon the floor, follows one’s minutest motions with an 
unexpectant, purposeless tenacity, watches the flickering of 
the flame or the sun-gleams on the wall, counts the quarries 
on the floor, watches even the hand of the clock, and pleases 
itself with detecting a rhythm in the tick. 

“ What a time o’ night this is to come home, Hetty ! ” 
said Mrs. Poyser. Look at the clock, do ; why, it ’s going 
on for half-past nine, and I ’ve sent the gells to bed this 
half-hour, and late enough too ; when they ’ve got to get 
up at half after four, and the mowers’ bottles to fill, and 

145 


10 


ADAM BEDE 


the baking ; and here ’s this blessed child wi’ the fever for 
what I know, and as wakeful as if it was dinner-time, and 
nobody to help me to give her the physic but your uncle, 
and fine work there ’s been, and half of it split on her night- 
gown, — it ’s well if she ’s swallowed more nor ’ull make 
her worse istead o’ better. But folks as have no mind to be 
o’ use have allays the luck to be out o’ the road when there ’s 
anything to be done.” 

“ I did set out before eight, aunt,” said Hetty, in a pettish 
tone, with a slight toss of her head. “ But this clock ’s so 
much before the clock at the Chase, there ’s no telling what 
time it ’ll be when I get here.” 

“ What ! you ’d be wanting the clock set by gentlefolks’s 
time, would you? an’ sit up burnin’ candle, an’ lie a-bed wi’ 
the sun a-bakin’ you like a cowcumber i’ the frame? The 
clock has n’t been put forrard for the first time to-day, I 
reckon.” 

The fact was, Hetty had really forgotten the difference of 
the clocks when she told Captain Donnithorne that she set 
out at eight; and this, with her lingering pace, had made 
her nearly half an hour later than usual. But here her 
aunt’s attention was diverted from this tender subject by 
Totty, who, perceiving at length that the arrival of her 
cousins was not likely to bring anything satisfactory to her 
in particular, began to cry, “ Munny, munny,” in an ex- 
plosive manner. 

“Well, then, my pet, mother’s got her, mother won’t 
leave her. Totty be a good dilling, and go to sleep now,” 
said Mrs. Poyser, leaning back and rocking the chair, while 
she tried to make Totty nestle against her. But Totty only 
cried louder, and said, “ Don’t yock ! ” So the mother, with 
that wondrous patience which love gives to the quickest 
temperament, sat up again, and pressed her cheek against 
the linen night-cap and kissed it, and forgot to scold Hetty 
any longer. 

“ Come, Hetty,” said Martin Poyser, in a conciliatory 
tone, “ go and get your supper i’ the pantry, as the things 
are all put away ; an’ then you can come and take the little 
un while your aunt undresses herself, for she won’t lie down 
in bed without her mother. An’ I reckon yon could eat a 

146 


THE RETURN HOME 


bit, Dinah, for they don’t keep much of a house down there.” 

“ No, thank you, uncle,” said Dinah ; “ I ate a good meal 
before I came away, for Mrs. Bede would make a kettle- 
cake for me.” 

“ I don’t want any supper,” said Hetty, taking off her 
hat. “ I can hold Totty now, if aunt wants me.” 

“ Why, what nonsense that is to talk ! ” said Mrs. Poyser. 
“ Do you think you can live wi’out eatin’, an’ nourish your 
inside wi’ stickin’ red ribbons on your head? Go an’ get 
your supper this minute, child ; there ’s a nice bit o’ cold 
pudding i’ the safe, — just what you ’re fond of.” 

Hetty complied silently by going towards the pantry, and 
Mrs. Poyser went on speaking to Dinah. 

“ Sit down, my dear, an’ look as if you knowed what it 
was to make yourself a bit comfortable i’ the world. I war- 
rant the old woman was glad to see you, since you stayed so 
long.” 

“ She seemed to like having me there at last ; but her 
sons say she does n’t like young women about her com- 
monly ; and I thought just at first she was almost angry 
with me for going.” 

“ Eh, it ’s a poor look-out when th’ ould folks doesna 
like the young uns,” said old Martin, bending his head 
down lower, and seeming to trace the pattern of the quarries 
with his eye. 

“ Ay, it ’s ill livin’ in a hen-roost for them as does n’t like 
fleas,” said Mrs. Poyser. We ’ve all had our turn at bein’ 
young, I reckon, be ’t good luck or ill.” 

“ But she must learn to ’commodate herself to young 
women,” said Mr. Poyser, “ for it is n’t to be counted on 
as Adam and Seth ’ull keep bachelors for the next ten year 
to please their mother. That ’ud be unreasonable. It is n’t 
right for old nor young nayther to make a bargain all o’ 
their own side. What ’s good for one ’s good all round i’ 
the long-run. I ’m no friend to young fellows a-marrying 
afore they know the difference atween a crab an’ a apple; 
but they may wait o’er long.” 

“ To be sure,” said Mrs. Poyser ; “ if you go past your 
dinner-time, there’ll be little relish o’ your meat. You 
turn it o’er an’ o’er wi’ your fork, an’ don’t eat it after all. 

^47 


ADAM BEDE 


You find faut wi’ your meat, an’ the faut ’s all i’ your own 
stomach.” 

Hetty now came back from the pantry, and said, I can 
take Totty now, aunt, if you like.” 

” Come, Rachel,” said Mr. Poyser, as his wife seemed to 
hesitate, seeing that Totty was at last nestling quietly, thee 
’dst better let Hetfy carry her upstairs, while thee tak’st thy 
things off. Thee ’t tired. It ’s time thee wast in bed. Thee 
’t bring on the pain in thy side again.” 

“ Well, she may hold her if the child ’ull go to her,” said 
Mrs. Poyser. 

Hetty went close to the rocking-chair, and stood without 
her usual smile, and without any attempt to entice Totty, 
simply waiting for her aunt to give the child into her hands. 

“ Wilt go to Cousin Hetty, my dilling, while mother gets 
ready to go to bed? Then Totty shall go into mother’s bed, 
and sleep there all night.” 

Before her mother had done speaking Totty had given 
her answer in an unmistakable manner, by knitting her 
brow, setting her tiny teeth against her under-lip, and lean- 
ing forward to slap Hetty on the arm with her utmost force. 
Then, without speaking, she nestled to her mother again. 

” Hey, hey,” said Mr. Poyser, while Hetty stood without 
moving, not go to Cousin Hetty ? That ’s like a babby ; 
Totty ’s a little woman, an’ not a babby.” 

It ’s no use trying to persuade her,” said Mrs. Poyser. 
“ She allays takes against Pletty when she is n’t well. Hap- 
pen she ’ll go to Dinah.” 

Dinah, having taken off her bonnet and shawl, had 
hitherto kept quietly seated in the background, not liking 
to thrust herself between Hetty and what was considered 
Hetty’s proper work. But now she came forward, and put- 
ting out her arms, said, ” Come, Totty, come and let Dinah 
carry her upstairs along with mother. Poor, poor mother! 
she ’s so tired, — she wants to go to bed.” 

Totty turned her face towards Dinah, and looked at her 
an instant, then lifted herself up, put out her little arms, and 
let Dinah lift her from her mother’s lap. Hetty turned away 
without any sign of ill-humour, and taking her hat from the 

148 


THE TWO BED-CHAMBERS 


table, stood waiting with an air of indifference, to see if she 
should be told to do anything else. 

“ You may make the door fast now, Poyser ; Alick ’s been 
come in this long while,” said Mrs. Poyser, rising with an 
appearance of relief from her low chair. ‘‘ Get me the 
matches down, Hetty, for I must have the rushlight burn- 
ing i’ my room.. Come, father.” 

The heavy wooden bolts began to roll in the house doors ; 
and old Martin prepared to move, by gathering up his blue 
handkerchief, and reaching his bright knobbed walnut-tree 
stick from the corner. Mrs. Poyser then led the way out 
of the kitchen, followed by the grandfather, and Dinah with 
Totty in her arm, — all going to bed by twilight, like the 
birds. Mrs. Poyser, on her way, peeped into the room where 
her two boys lay, just to see their ruddy round cheeks on 
the pillow, and to hear for a moment their light regular 
breathing. 

“ Come, Hetty, get to bed,” said Mr. Poyser, in a soothing 
tone, as he himself turned to go upstairs. “ You didna 
mean to be late, I ’ll be bound, but your aunt ’s been wor- 
rited to-day. Good-night, my wench, good-night.” 


CHAPTER XV. 

THE TWO BED-CHAMBERS. 

H etty and Dinah both slept in the second story, in 
rooms adjoining each other, meagrely furnished rooms, 
with no blinds to shut out the light, which was now beginning 
to gather new strength from the rising of the moon, — more 
than enough strength to enable Hetty to move about and un- 
dress with perfect comfort. She could see quite well the pegs 
in the old painted linen-press on which she hung her hat and 
gown ; she could see the head of every pin on her red cloth 
pin-cushion; she could see a reflection of herself in the old- 
fashioned looking-glass, quite as distinct as was needful, con- 
sidering that she had only to brush her hair and put on her 
night-cap. A queer old looking-glass ! Hetty got into an 

149 


ADAM BEDE 


ill-temper with it almost every time she dressed. It had been 
considered a handsome glass in its day, and had probably been 
bought into the Poyser family a quarter of a century before, 
at a sale of genteel household furniture. Even now an auc- 
tioneer could say something for it : it had a great deal of tar- 
nished gilding about it; it had a firm mahogany base, well 
supplied with drawers, which opened with a decided jerk, and 
set the contents leaping out from the farthest corners, without 
giving you the trouble of reaching them ; above all, it had a 
brass candle-socket on each side, which would give it an aris- 
tocratic air to the very last. But Hetty objected to it because 
it had numerous dim blotches sprinkled over the mirror, 
which no rubbing would remove, and because, instead of 
swinging backwards and forwards, it was fixed in an upright 
position, so that she could only get one good view of her head 
and neck, and that was to be had only by sitting down on a 
low chair before her dressing-table. And the dressing-table 
was no dressing-table at all, but a small old chest of drawers, 
— the most awkward thing in the world to sit down before, 
for the big brass handles quite hurt her knees, and she 
couldn’t get near the glass at all comfortably. But devout 
\vorshippers never allow inconveniences to prevent them from 
performing their religious rites, and Hetty this evening was 
more bent on her peculiar form of worship than usual. 

Having taken off her gown and white kerchief, she drew 
a key from the large pocket that hung outside her petticoat, 
and, unlocking one of the lower drawers in the chest, reached 
from it two short bits of wax candle, — secretly bought at 
Treddleston, — and stuck them in the two brass sockets. 
Then she drew forth a bundle of matches, and lighted the 
candles ; and last of all, a small red-framed shilling looking- 
glass, without blotches. It was into this small glass that she 
chose to look first after seating herself. She looked into it, 
smiling, and turning her head on one side, for a minute, then 
laid it down and took out her brush and comb from an upper 
drawer. She was going to let down her hair, and make her- 
self look like that picture of a lady in Miss Lydia Donni- 
thome’s dressing-room. It was soon done, and the dark 
hyacinthine curves fell on her neck. It was not heavy, mas- 
sive, merely rippling hair, but soft and silken, running at 

150 


THE TWO BED-CHAMBERS 


every opportunity into delicate rings. But she pushed it all 
backward, to look like the picture, and form a dark curtain, 
throwing into relief her round, white neck. Then she put 
down her brush and comb, and looked at herself, folding her 
arms before her, still like the picture. Even the old mottled 
glass could n't help sending back a lovely image, none the less 
lovely because Hetty’s stays were not of white satin, — such 
as I feel sure heroines must generally wear, — but of a dark 
greenish cotton texture. 

Oh, yes ! she was very pretty, — Captain Donnithorne 
thought so; prettier than anybody about Hayslope, prettier 
than any of the ladies she had ever seen visiting at the Chase, 
— indeed, it seemed fine ladies were rather old and ugly, — 
and prettier than Miss Bacon, the miller’s daughter, who was 
called the beauty of Treddleston. And Hetty looked at her- 
self to-night with quite a different sensation from what she 
had ever felt before ; there was an invisible spectator whose 
eye rested on her like morning on the flowers. His soft voice 
was saying over and over again those pretty things she had 
heard in the wood; his arm was round her, and the delicate 
rose-scent of his hair was with her still. The vainest woman 
is never thoroughly conscious of her own beauty till she is 
loved by the man who sets her own passion vibrating in 
return. 

But Hetty seemed to have made up her mind that some- 
thing was wanting, for she got up and reached an old black 
lace scarf out of the linen-press, and a pair of large ear-rings 
out of the sacred drawer from which she had taken her can- 
dles. It was an old, old scarf, full of rents, but it would 
make a becoming border round her shoulders, and set off 
the whiteness of her upper arm. And she would take out the 
little ear-rings she had in her ears — oh, how her aunt had 
scolded her for having her ears bored ! — and put in those, 
large ones : they were but coloured glass and gilding ; but if 
you didn’t know what they were made of, they looked just 
as well as what the ladies wore. And so she sat down again, 
with the large ear-rings in her ears, and the black lace scarf 
adjusted round her shoulders. She looked down at her arms : 
no arms could be prettier down to a little way below the 
elbow, — they were white and plump, and dimpled to match 

151 


ADAM BEDE 


her cheeks ; but towards the wrist, she thought with vexation 
that they were coarsened by butter-making, and other work 
that ladies never did. 

Captain Donnithorne couldn’t like her to go on doing 
work : he would like to see her in nice clothes, and thin shoes, 
and white stockings, perhaps with silk clocks to them ; for he 
must love her very much, — no one else had ever put his arm 
round her and kissed her in that way. He would want to 
marry her, and make a lady of her ; she could hardly dare to 
shape the thought, — yet how else could it be ? Marry her 
quite secretly, as Mr. James, the Doctor’s assistant, married 
the Doctor’s niece, and nobody ever found it out for a long 
while after, and then it was of no use to be angry. The Doc- 
tor had told her aunt all about it in Hetty’s hearing. She 
did n’t know how it would be, but it was quite plain the old 
Squire could never be told anything about it, for Hetty was 
ready to faint with awe and fright if she came across him at 
the Chase. He might have been earth-born, for what she 
knew : it had never entered her mind that he had been young 
like other men; he had always been the old Squire at whom 
everybody was frightened. Oh, it was impossible to think 
how it would be ! But Captain Donnithorne would know ; he 
was a great gentleman, and could have his way in everything, 
and could buy everything he liked. And nothing could be 
as it had been again ; perhaps some day she should be a grand 
lady, and ride in her coach, and dress for dinner in a brocaded 
silk, with feathers in her hair, and her dress sweeping the 
ground, like Miss Lydia and Lady Dacey, when she saw them 
going into the dining-room one evening, as she peeped 
through the little round window in the lobby ; only she should 
not be old and ugly like Miss Lydia, or all the same thickness 
like Lady Dacey, but very pretty, with her hair done in a 
great many different ways, and sometimes in a pink dress, 
and sometimes in a white one, — she did n’t know which she 
liked best; and Mary Burge and everybody would perhaps 
see her going out in her carriage, — or rather, they would 
hear of it : it was impossible to imagine these things happen- 
ing at Hayslope in sight of her aunt. At the thought of all 
this splendour Hetty got up from her chair, and in doing so 
caught the little red-framed glass with the edge of her scarf, 

152 


THE TWO BED-CHAMBERS 


so that it fell with a bang on the floor ; but she was too eagerly 
occupied with her vision to care about picking it up ; and after 
a momentary start, began to pace with a pigeon-like stateli- 
ness backwards and forwards along her room, in her col- 
oured stays and coloured skirt, and the old black lace scarf 
round her shoulders, and the great glass ear-rings in her 
ears. 

How pretty the little puss looks in that odd dress! It 
would be the easiest folly in the world to fall in love with her : 
there is such a sweet baby-like roundness about her face and 
figure ; the delicate dark rings of hair lie so charmingly about 
her ears and neck ; her great dark eyes with their long eye- 
lashes touch one so strangely, as if an imprisoned frisky 
sprite looked out of them. 

Ah, what a prize the man gets who wins a sweet bride like 
Hetty ! How the men envy him who come to the wedding 
breakfast, and see her hanging on his arm in her white lace 
and orange blossoms ! The dear, young, round, soft, flexible 
thing I Her heart must be just as soft, her temper just as free 
from angles, her character just as pliant. If anything ever 
goes wrong, it must be the husband’s fault there; he can 
make her what he likes, — that is plain. And the lover him- 
self thinks so too : the little darling is so fond of him, her 
little vanities are so bewitching, he would n’t consent to her 
being a bit wiser; those kitten-like glances and movements 
are just what one wants to make one’s hearth a paradise. 
Every man under such circumstances is conscious of being 
a great physiognomist. Nature, he knows, has a language 
of her own, which she uses with strict veracity, and he con- 
siders himself an adept in the language. Nature has written 
out his bride’s character for him in those exquisite lines of 
cheek and lip and chin, in those eyelids delicate as petals, in 
those long lashes curled like the stamen of a flower, in the 
dark liquid depths of those wonderful eyes. How she will 
doat on her children ! She is almost a child herself, and the 
little pink round things will hang about her like florets round 
the central flower; and the husband will look on smiling be- 
nignly, able, whenever he chooses, to withdraw into the 
sanctuary of his wisdom, towards which his sweet wife will 
look reverently, and never lift the curtain. It is a marriage 

153 


"ADAM BEDE 


such as they made in the golden age, when the men were all 
wise and majestic, and the women all lovely and loving. 

It was very much in this way that our friend Adam Bede 
thought about Hetty; only he put his thoughts into different 
words. If ever she behaved with cold vanity towards him, 
he said to himself, it is only because she does n’t love me 
well enough; and he was sure that her love, whenever she 
gave it, would be the most precious thing a man could possess 
on earth. Before you despise Adam as deficient in penetra- 
tion, pray ask yourself if you were ever predisposed to be- 
lieve evil of any pretty woman, — if you ever could, without 
hard head-breaking demonstration, believe evil of the one 
supremely pretty woman who has bewitched you. No: peo- 
ple who love downy peaches are apt not to think of the stone, 
and sometimes jar their teeth terribly against it. 

Arthur Donnithorne, too, had the same sort of notion about 
Hetty, so far as he had thought of her nature at all. He felt 
sure she was a dear, affectionate, good little thing. The man 
who awakes the wondering, tremulous passion of a young 
girl always thinks her affectionate ; and if he chances to look 
forward to future years, probably imagines himself being 
virtuously tender to her, because the poor thing is so cling- 
ingly fond of him. God made these dear worrien so, — and 
it is a convenient arrangement in case of sickness. 

After all, I believe the wisest of us must be beguiled in this 
way sometimes, and must think both better and worse of peo- 
ple than they deserve. Nature has her language, and she is 
not unveracious; but we don’t know all the intricacies of her 
syntax just yet, and in a hasty reading we may happen to 
extract the very opposite of her real meaning. Long dark 
eyelashes, now, — what can be more exquisite ? I find it im- 
possible not to expect some depth of soul behind a deep gray 
eye with a long dark eyelash, in spite of an experience which 
has shown me that they may go along with deceit, peculation, 
and stupidity. But if, in the reaction of disgust, I have de- 
taken myself to a fishy eye, there has been a surprising sim- 
ilarity of result. One begins to suspect at length that there 
is no direct correlation between eyelashes and morals ; or else, 
that the eyelashes express the disposition of the fair one’s 
grandmother, which is on the whole less important to us. 

154 


‘‘Began to pace with a pigeon-like stateliness 
backwards and forwards” 




* - r - . 







THE TWO BED-CHAMBERS 


No eyelashes could be more beautiful than Hetty's; and 
now, while she walks with her pigeon-like stateliness along 
the room, and looks down on her shoulders bordered by the 
old black lace, the dark fringe shows to perfection on her pink 
cheek. They are but dim, ill-defined pictures that her narrow 
bit of an imagination can make of the future; but of every 
picture she is the central figure, in fine clothes ; Captain Don- 
nithorne is very close to her, putting his arm round her, per- 
haps kissing her ; and everybody else is admiring and envying 
her, — especially Mary Burge, whose new print dress looks 
very contemptible by the side of Hetty’s resplendent toilet. 
Does any sweet or sad memory mingle with this dream of the 
future, — any loving thought of her second parents, — of the 
children she had helped to tend, — of any youthful compan- 
ion, any pet animal, any relic of her own childhood even? 
Not one. There are some plants that have hardly any roots ; 
you may tear them from their native nook of rock or wall, 
and just lay them over your ornamental flower-pot, and they 
blossom none the worse. Hetty could have cast all her past 
life behind her, and never cared to be reminded of it again. 
I think she had no feeling at all towards the old house, and 
did not like the Jacob’s Ladder and the long row of hollyhocks 
in the garden better than other flowers, — perhaps not so 
well. It was wonderful how little she seemed to care about 
waiting on her uncle, who had been a good father to her ; she 
hardly ever remembered to reach him his pipe at the right 
time without being told, unless a visitor happened to be there, 
who would have a better opportunity of seeing her as she 
walked across the hearth. Hetty did not understand how 
anybody could be very fond of middle-aged people; and as 
for those tiresome children, Marty and Tommy and Totty, 
they had been the very nuisance of her life, — as bad as buz- 
zing insects that will come teasing you on a hot day when you 
want to be quiet. Marty, the eldest, was a baby when she 
first came to the farm, for the children born before him had 
died ; and so Hetty had had them all three, one after the other, 
toddling by her side in the meadow, or playing about her on 
wet days in the half-empty rooms of the large old house. 
The boys were out of hand now ; but Totty was still a day- 
long plague, worse than either of the others had been, be- 

155 


ADAM BEDE 


cause there was more fuss made about her. And there was 
no end to the making and mending of clothes. Hetty would 
have been glad to hear that she should never see a child 
again; they were worse than the nasty little lambs that the 
shepherd was always bringing in to be taken special care of 
in lambing time ; for the lambs were got rid of sooner or later. 
As for the young chickens and turkeys, Hetty would have 
have hated the very word hatching,” if her aunt had not 
bribed her to attend to the young poultry by promising her the 
proceeds of one out of every brood. The round downy chicks 
peeping out from under their mother’s wing never touched 
Hetty with any pleasure; that was not the sort of prettiness 
she cared about, but she did care about the prettiness of the 
new things she would buy for herself at Treddleston fair with 
the money they fetched. And yet she looked so dimpled, so 
charming, as she stooped down to put the soaked bread under 
the hen-coop, that you must have been a very acute personage 
indeed to suspect her of that hardness. Molly, the house- 
maid, with a turn-up nose and a protuberant jaw, was really 
a tender-hearted girl, and, as Mrs. Poyser said, a jewel to 
look after the poultry ; but her stolid face showed nothing of 
this maternal delight, any more than a brown earthenware 
pitcher will show the light of the lamp within it. 

It is generally a feminine eye that first detects the moral 
deficiencies hidden under the “ dear deceit ” of beauty ; so 
it is not surprising that Mrs. Poyser, with her keenness and 
abundant opportunity for observation, should have formed 
a tolerably fair estimate of what might be expected from 
Hetty in the way of feeling, and in moments of indignation 
she had sometimes spoken with great openness on the sub- 
ject to her husband. 

She ’s no better than a peacock, as ’ud strut about on 
the wall, and spread its tail when the sun shone, if all the folks 
i’ the parish was dying ; there ’s nothing seems to give her a 
turn i’ th’ inside, not even when we thought Totty had tum- 
bled into the pit. To think o’ that dear cherub! And we 
found her wi’ her little shoes stuck i’ the mud, an’ crying fit 
to break her heart by the far horse-pit. But Hetty never 
minded it, I could see, though she ’s been at the nussin’ o’ the 

156 


THE TWO BED-CHAMBERS 


child ever since it was a babby. It’s my belief her heart’s 
as hard as a pebble.” 

Nay, nay,” said Mr. Poyser, “ thee mustn’t judge Hetty 
too hard. Them young gells are like the unripe grain ; they ’ll 
make good meal by and by, but they ’re squashy as yet. 
Thee ’t see Hetty ’ll be all right when she ’s got a good hus- 
band and children of her own.” 

'' / don’t want to be hard upo’ the gell. She ’s got diver 
fingers of her own, and can be useful enough when she likes, 
and I should miss her wi’ the butter, for she ’s got a cool 
hand. An’ let be what may, I ’d strive to do my part by a 
niece o’ yours, an’ that I ’ve done : for I ’ve taught her every- 
thing as belongs to a house, an’ I ’ve told her her duty often 
enough, though, God knows, I ’ve no breath to spare, an’ that 
catchin’ pain comes on dreadful by times. Wi’ them three 
gells in the house I ’d need have twice the strength, to keep 
’em up to their work. It ’s like having roast meat at three 
fires; as soon as you ’ve basted one, another ’s burnin’.” 

Hetty stood sufficiently in awe of her aunt to be anxious to 
conceal from her so much of her vanity as could be hidden 
without too great a sacrifice. She could not resist spending 
her money in bits of finery which Mrs. Poyser disapproved; 
but she would have been ready to die with shame, vexation, 
and fright, if her aunt had this moment opened the door, and 
seen her with her bits of candle lighted, and strutting about 
decked in her scarf and ear-rings. To prevent such a sur- 
prise, she always bolted her door, and she had not forgotten 
to do so to-night. It was well; for there now came a light 
tap, and Hetty, with a leaping heart, rushed to blow out the 
candles and throw them into the drawer. She dared not stay 
to take out her ear-rings, but she threw off her scarf, and let 
it fall on the floor, before the light tap came again. We shall 
know how it was that the light tap came, if we leave Hetty 
for a short time, and return to Dinah, at the moment when 
she had delivered Totty to her mother’s arms, and was come 
upstairs to her bedroom, adjoining Hetty’s. 

Dinah delighted in her bedroom window. Being on the 
second story of that tall house, it gave her a wide view over 
the fields. The thickness of the wall formed a broad step 
about a yard below the window, where she could place her 

157 


ADAM BEDE 


chair. And now the first thing she did, on entering her room, 
was to seat herself in this chair, and look out on the peaceful 
fields beyond which the large moon was rising, just above the 
hedgerow elms. She liked the pasture best where the milch 
cows were lying, and next to that the meadow where the 
grass was half mown, and lay in silvered sweeping lines. Her 
heart was very full, for there was to be only one more night 
on which she would look out on those fields for a long time 
to come ; but she thought little of leaving the mere scene, for 
to her bleak Snowfield had just as many charms : she thought 
of all the dear people whom she had learned to care for among 
these peaceful fields, and who now would have a place in her 
loving remembrance forever. She thought of the struggles 
and the weariness that might lie before them in the rest of 
their life’s journey, when she would be away from them, and 
know nothing of what was befalling them; and the pressure 
of this thought soon became too strong for her to enjoy the 
unresponding stillness of the moonlit fields. She closed her 
eyes that she might feel more intensely the presence of a Love 
and Sympathy deeper and more tender than was breathed 
from the earth and sky. That was often Dinah’s mode of 
praying in solitude. Simply to close her eyes, and to feel 
herself enclosed by the Divine Presence; then gradually her 
fears, her yearning anxieties for others, melted away like ice- 
crystals in a warm ocean. She had sat in this way perfectly 
still, with her hands crossed on her lap, and the pale light 
resting on her calm face, for at least ten minutes, when she 
was startled by a loud sound, apparently of something falling 
in Hetty’s room. But like all sounds that fall on our ears in 
a state of abstraction, it had no distinct character, but was 
simply loud and startling, so that she felt uncertain whether 
she had interpreted it rightly. She rose and listened, but all 
was quiet afterwards, and she reflected that Hetty might 
merely have knocked something down in getting into bed. 
She began slowly to undress ; but now, owing to the sugges- 
tions of this sound, her thoughts became concentrated on 
Hetty : that sweet young thing, with life and all its trials be- 
fore her, — the solemn daily duties of the wife and mother, 
— and her mind so unprepared for them all ; bent merely on 
little foolish, selfish pleasures, like a child hugging its toys in 

158 


THE TWO BED-CHAMBERS 

the beginning of a long toilsome journey, in which it will 
have to bear hunger and cold and unsheltered darkness. 
Dinah felt a double care for Hetty, because she shared Seth’s 
anxious interest in his brother’s lot, and she had not come to 
the conclusion that Hetty did not love Adam well enough to 
marry him. She saw too clearly the absence of any warm, 
self-devoting love in Hetty’s nature, to regard the coldness 
of her behaviour towards Adam as any indication that he 
was not the man she would like to have for a husband. And 
this blank in Hetty’s nature, instead of exciting Dinah’s dis- 
like, only touched her with a deeper pity. The lovely face 
and form affected her as beauty always affects a pure and 
tender mind, free from selfish jealousies: it was an excellent, 
divine gift, that gave a deeper pathos to the need, the sin, the 
sorrow with which it was mingled, as the canker in a lily- 
white bud is more grievous to behold than in a common pot- 
herb. 

By the time Dinah had undressed and put on her night- 
gown, this feeling about Hetty had gathered a painful in- 
tensity; her imagination had created a thorny thicket of sin 
and sorrow, in which she saw the poor thing struggling, torn 
and bleeding, looking with tears for rescue and finding none. 
It was in this way that Dinah’s imagination and sympathy 
acted and reacted habitually, each heightening the other. 
She felt a deep longing to go now and pour into Hetty’s ear 
all the words of tender warning and appeal that rushed into 
her mind. But perhaps Hetty was already asleep. Dinah 
put her ear to the partition, and heard still some slight noises, 
which convinced her that Hetty was not yet in bed. Still she 
hesitated ; she was not quite certain of a divine direction ; the 
voice that told her to go to Hetty seemed no stronger than 
the other voice which said that Hetty was weary, and that 
going to her now in an unseasonable moment would only tend 
to close her heart more obstinately. Dinah was not satisfied 
without a more unmistakable guidance than those inward 
voices. There was light enough for her, if she opened her 
Bible, to discern the text sufficiently to know what it would 
say to her. She knew the physiognomy of every page, and 
could tell on what book she opened, sometimes on what 
chapter, without seeing title or number. It was a small, 

159 


ADAM BEDE 


thick Bible, worn quite round at the edges. Dinah laid it 
sideways on the window ledge, where the light was strongest, 
and then opened it with her forefinger. The first words she 
looked at were those at the top of the left-hand page : '' And 
they all wept sore, and fell on Paul’s neck and kissed him.” 
That was enough for Dinah ; she had opened on that memora- 
ble parting at Ephesus, when Paul had felt bound to open his 
heart in a last exhortation and warning. She hesitated no 
longer, but, opening her own door gently, went and tapped 
at Hetty’s. We know she had to tap twice, because Hetty 
had to put out the candles and throw off her black lace scarf ; 
but after the second tap the door was opened immediately. 
Dinah said, “ Will you let me come in, Hetty ? ” and Hetty 
without speaking, for she was confused and vexed, opened 
the door wider and let her in. 

What a strange contrast the two figures made! Visible 
enough in that mingled twilight and moonlight. Hetty, her 
cheeks flushed and her eyes glistening from her imaginary 
drama, her beautiful neck and arms bare, her hair hang- 
ing in a curly tangle down her back, and the baubles in 
her ears ; Dinah, covered with her long white dress, her pale 
face full of subdued emotion, almost like a lovely corpse into 
which the soul has returned charged with sublimer secrets 
and a sublimer love. They were nearly of the same height; 
Dinah evidently a little the taller as she put her arm round 
Hetty’s waist, and kissed her forehead. 

“ I knew you were not in bed, my dear,” she said, in her 
sweet, clear voice, which was irritating to Hetty, mingling 
with her own peevish vexation like music with jangling 
chains, ‘‘ for I heard you moving ; and I longed to speak to 
you again to-night, for it is the last but one that I shall be 
here, and we don’t know what may happen to-morrow to keep 
us apart. Shall I sit down with you while you do up your 
hair ? ” 

“ Oh, yes,” said Hetty, hastily turning round and reaching 
the second chair in the room, glad that Dinah looked as if she 
did not notice her ear-rings. 

Dinah sat down, and Hetty began to brush together her 
hair before twisting it up, doing it with that air of excessive 
indifference which belongs to confused self-consciousness. 

i6o 


THE TWO BED-CHAMBERS 


But the expression of Dinah’s eyes gradually relieved her; 
they seemed unobservant of all details. 

“ Dear Hetty,” she said, “ it has been borne in upon my 
mind to-night that you may some day be in trouble, — trouble 
is appointed for us all here below, and there comes a time 
when we need more comfort and help than the things of this 
life can give. I want to tell you that if ever you are in trouble, 
and need a friend that will always feel for you and love you, 
you have got that friend in Dinah Morris at Snowfield; and 
if you come to her, or send for her, she ’ll never forget this 
night and the words she is speaking to you now. Will you 
remember it, Hetty? ” 

“ Yes,” said Hetty, rather frightened. “ But why should 
you think I shall be in trouble ? Do you know of anything ? ” 

Hetty had seated herself as she tied on her cap; and now 
Dinah leaned forwards and took her hands as she an- 
swered, — 

“ Because, dear, trouble comes to us all in this life : we set 
our hearts on things which it is n’t God’s will for us to have, 
and then we go .sorrowing ; the people we love are taken from 
us, and we can joy in nothing because they are not with us; 
sickness comes, and we faint under the burden of our feeble 
bodies ; we go astray and do wrong, and bring ourselves into 
trouble with our fellow-men. There is no man or woman 
born into this world to whom some of these trials do not fall, 
and so I feel that some of them must happen to you; and I 
desire for you, that while you are young you should seek for 
strength from your Heavenly Father, that you may have a 
support which will not fail you in the evil day.” 

Dinah paused and released Hetty’s hands, that she might 
not hinder her. Hetty sat quite still. She felt no response 
within herself to Dinah’s anxious affection ; but Dinah’s 
words, uttered with solemn, pathetic distinctness, affected her 
with a chill fear. Her flush had died away almost to paleness ; 
she had the timidity of a luxurious, pleasure-seeking nature, 
which shrinks from the hint of pain. Dinah saw the effect; 
and her tender, anxious pleading became the more earnest, 
till Hetty, full of a vague fear that something evil was some 
time to befall her, began to cry. 

It is our habit to say that while the lower nature can never 

i6i 


11 


ADAM BEDE 


understand the higher, the higher nature commands a com- 
plete view of the lower. But I think the higher nature has to 
learn this comprehension, as we learn the art of vision, by a 
good deal of hard experience, often with bruises and gashes 
incurred in taking things up by the wrong end, and fancying 
our space wider than it is. Dinah had never seen Hetty 
affected in this way before, and, with her usual benignant 
hopefulness, she trusted it was the stirring of a divine im- 
pulse. She kissed the sobbing thing, and began to cry with 
her for grateful joy. But Hetty was simply in that excitable 
state of mind in which there is no calculating what turn the 
feelings may take from one moment to another, and for the 
first time she became irritated under Dinah’s caress. She 
pushed her away impatiently, and said, with a childish, sob- 
bing voice, — 

‘‘ Don’t talk to me so, Dinah. Why do you come to frighten 
me ? I ’ve never done anything to you. Why can’t you let 
me be ? ” 

Poor Dinah felt a pang. She was too wise to persist, and 
only said mildly : Yes, my dear, you ’re tired ; I won’t hin- 
der you any longer. Make haste and get into bed. Good- 
night.” 

She went out of the room almost as quietly and quickly as 
if she had been a ghost ; but once by the side of her own bed, 
she threw herself on her knees, and poured out in deep silence 
all the passionate pity that filled her heart. 

As for Hetty, she was soon in the wood again, — her wak- 
ing dreams being merged in a sleeping life scarcely more 
fragmentary and confused. 


CHAPTER XVI. 


LINKS. 


RTHUR DONNITHORNE, you remember, is under 



an engagement with himself to go and see Mr. Irwine 
this Friday morning, and he is awake and dressing so early 
that he determines to go before breakfast, instead of after. 
The Rector, he knows, breakfasts alone at half-past nine, 


162 


LINKS 


the ladies of the family having a different breakfast hour; 
Arthur will have an early ride over the hill, and breakfast 
with him. One can say everything best over a meal. 

The progress of civilization has made a breakfast or a 
dinner an easy and cheerful substitute for more trouble- 
some and disagreeable ceremonies. We take a less gloomy 
view of our errors now our father confessor listens to us over 
his egg and coffee. We are more distinctly conscious that 
rude penances are out of the question for gentlemen in an 
enlightened age, and that mortal sin is not incompatible 
with an appetite for muffins. An assault on our pockets, 
which in more barbarous times would have been made in 
the brusque form of a pistol-shot, is quite a well-bred and 
smiling procedure now it has become a request for a loan 
thrown in as an easy parenthesis between the second and 
third glasses of claret. 

Still, there was this advantage in the old, rigid forms, — 
that they committed you to the fulfilment of a resolution 
by some outward deed. When you have put your mouth to 
one end of a hole in a stone wall, and are aware that there 
is an expectant ear at the other end, you are more likely to 
say what you came out with the intention of saying, than 
if you were seated with your legs in an easy attitude under 
the mahogany, with a companion who will have no reason 
to be surprised if you have nothing particular to say. 

However, Arthur Donnithorne, as he Avinds among the 
pleasant lanes on horseback in the morning sunshine, has 
a sincere determination to open his heart to the Rector; 
and the swirling sound of the scythe as he passes by the 
meadow is all the pleasanter to him because of this honest 
purpose. He is glad to see the promise of settled weather 
now, for getting in the hay,^ about which the farmers have 
been fearful ; and there is something so healthful in the 
sharing of a joy that is general and not merely personal, 
that this thought about the hay-harvest reacts on his state 
of mind, and makes his resolution seem an easier matter. 
A man about town might perhaps consider that these in- 
fluences were not to be felt out of a child’s story-book ; but 
when you are among the fields and hedgerows, it is impos- 

163 


ADAM BEDE 


sible to maintain a consistent superiority to simple natural 
pleasures. 

Arthur had passed the village of Hayslope, and was ap- 
proaching the Broxton side of the hill, when, at a turning 
in the road, he saw a figure about a hundred yards before 
him which it was impossible to mistake for any one else 
than Adam Bede, even if there had been no gray, tailless 
shepherd-dog at his heels. He was striding along at his 
usual rapid pace ; and Arthur pushed on his horse to over- 
take him, for he retained too much of his boyish feeling 
for Adam to miss an opportunity of chatting with him. 1 
will not say that his love for that good fellow did not owe 
some of its force to the love of patronage : our friend Ar- 
thur liked to do everything that was handsome, and to have 
his handsome deeds recognized. 

Adam looked round as he heard the quickening clatter 
of the horse’s heels, and waited for the horseman, lifting 
his paper cap from his head with a bright smile of recogni- 
tion. Next to his own brother Seth, Adam would have done 
more for Arthur Donnithorne than for any other young 
man in the world. There was hardly anything he would 
not rather have lost than the two-feet ruler which he always 
carried in his pocket ; it was Arthur’s present, bought with 
his pocket-money when he was a fair-haired lad of eleven, 
and when he had profited so well by Adam’s lessons in car- 
pentering and turning, as to embarrass every female in the 
house with gifts of superfluous thread-reels and round boxes. 
Adam had quite a pride in the little squire in those early 
days, and the feeling had only become slightly modified as 
the fair-haired lad had grown into the whiskered young 
man. Adam, I confess, was very susceptible to the influ- 
ence of rank, and quite ready to give an extra amount of 
respect to every one who had more advantages than him- 
self, not being a philosopher, or a proletaire with demo- 
cratic ideas, but simply a stout-limbed, clever carpenter with 
a large fund of reverence in his nature, which inclined him 
to admit all established claims unless he saw very clear 
grounds for questioning them. He had no theories about 
setting the world to rights, but he saw there was a great 
deal of damage done by building with ill-seasoned timber, — 

164 


LINKS 


by ignorant men in fine clothes making plans for outhouses 
and work-shops and the like, without knowing the bearings 
of things, — by slovenly joiners’ work, and by hasty con- 
tracts that could never be fulfilled without ruining some- 
body ; and he resolved, for his part, to set his face against 
such doings. On these points he would have maintained his 
opinion against the largest landed proprietor in Loamshire 
or Stonyshire either ; but he felt that beyond these it would 
be better for him to defer to people who were more knowing 
than himself. He saw as plainly as possible how ill the 
woods on the estate were managed, and the shameful state 
of the farm-buildings; and if old Squire Donnithorne had 
asked him the effect of this mismanagement, he would have 
spoken his opinion without flinching, but the impulse to a 
respectful demeanour towards a “ gentleman ” would have 
been strong within him all the while. The word f gentle- 
man ” had a spell for Adam, and, as he often said, he 
“ could n’t abide a fellow who thought he made himself fine 
by being coxy to ’s betters.” I must remind you again that 
Adam had the blood of the peasant in his veins, and that 
since he was in his prime half a century ago, you must ex- 
pect some of his characteristics to be obsolete. 

Towards the young squire this instinctive reverence of 
Adam’s was assisted by boyish memories and personal re- 
gard ; so you may imagine that he thought far more of 
Arthur’s good qualities, and attached far more value to very 
slight actions of his, than if they had been the qualities and 
actions of a common workman like himself. He felt sure 
it would be a fine day for everybody about Hayslope when 
the young squire came into the estate, — such a generous, 
open-hearted disposition as he had, and an uncommon ” 
notion about improvements and repairs, considering he was 
only just coming of age. Thus there was both respect and 
affection in the smile with which he raised his paper cap as 
Arthur Donnithorne rode up. 

'‘Well, Adam, how are you?” said Arthur, holding out 
his hand. He never shook hands with any of the farmers, 
and Adam felt the honour keenly. “ I could swear to your 
back a long way off. It ’s just the same back, only broader, 
as when you used to carry me on it. Do you remember? ” 

165 


ADAM BEDE 


“ Ay, sir, I remember. It ’ud be a poor look-out if folks 
did n’t remember what they did and said when they were 
lads. We should think no more about old friends than we 
do about new uns, then.” 

“You’re going to Broxton, I suppose?” said Arthur, 
putting his horse on at a slow pace while Adam walked by 
his side. “ Are you going to the Rectory ? ” 

“ No, sir, I ’m going to see about Bradwell’s barn. 
They ’re afraid of the roof pushing the walls out ; and I ’m 
going to see what can be done with it before we send the 
stuff and the workmen.” 

“ Why, Burge trusts almost everything to you now, Adam, 
doesn’t he? I should think Jie will make you his partner 
soon. He will, if he ’s wise.” 

“ Nay, sir, I don’t see as he ’d be much the better off for 
that. A foreman, if he ’s got a conscience, and delights in 
his work, will do his business as well as if he was a partner. 
I would n’t give a penny for a man as ’ud drive a nail in slack 
because he did n’t get extra pay for it.” 

“ I know that, Adam ; I know you work for him as well 
as if you were working for yourself. But you would have 
more power than you have now, and could turn the busi- 
ness to better account perhaps. The old man must give up 
his business sometime, and he has no son ; I suppose he ’ll 
want a son-in-law who can take to it. But he has rather 
grasping fingers of his own, I fancy ; I dare say he wants a 
man who can put some money into the business. If I were 
not as poor as a rat, I would gladly invest some money in 
that way, for the sake of having you settled on the estate. 
I ’m sure I should profit by it in the end. ‘ And perhaps 
I shall be better off in a year or two. I shall have a larger 
allowance now I ’m of age ; and when I ’ve paid off a debt 
or two, I shall be able to look about me.” 

“You ’re very good to say so, sir, and I ’m not unthank- 
ful. But,” Adam continued, in a decided tone, “ I should n’t 
like to make any offers to Mr. Burge, or t’ have any made 
for me. I see no clear road to a partnership. If he should 
ever want to dispose of the business, that ’ud be a different 
matter. I should be glad of some money at a fair interest 
then, for I feel sure I could pay it off in time.” 

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“ Very well, Adam,” said Arthur, remembering what Mr. 
Irwine had said about a probable hitch in the love-making 
between Adam and Mary Burge, “ we ’ll say no more about 
it at present. When is your father to be buried? ” 

“On Sunday, sir; Mr. Irwine ’s coming earlier on pur- 
pose. I shall be glad when it ’s over, for I think my mother 
’ull perhaps get easier then. It cuts one sadly to see the 
grief of old people ; they ’ve no way o’ working it off, and 
the new spring brings no new shoots out on the withered 
tree.” 

“ Ah, you ’ve had a good deal of trouble and vexation in 
your life, Adam. I don’t think you ’ve ever been bare- 
brained and light-hearted, like other youngsters. You ’ve 
always had some care on your mind.” 

“ Why, yes, sir ; but that ’s nothing to make a fuss about. 
If we Ve men, and have men’s feelings, I reckon we must 
have men’s troubles. We can’t be like the birds, as fly from 
their nest as soon as they ’ve got their wings, and never 
know their kin when they see ’em, and get a fresh lot every 
year. I ’ve had enough to be thankful for : I ’ve allays had 
health and strength and brains to give me a delight in my 
work ; and I count it a great thing as I ’ve had Bartle 
Massey’s night-school to go to. He ’s helped me to knowl- 
edge I could never ha’ got by myself.” 

“ What a rare fellow you are, Adam ! ” said Arthur, after 
a pause, in which he had looked musingly at the big fellow 
walking by his side. “ I could hit out better than most men 
at Oxford, and yet I believe you would knock me into next 
week if I were to have a battle with you.” 

“ God forbid I should ever do that, sir ! ” said Adam, 
looking round at Arthur, and smiling. “ I used to fight 
for fun ; but I ’ve never done that since I was the cause o’ 
poor Gil Tranter being laid up for a fortnight. I ’ll never 
fight any man again, only when he behaves like a scoundrel. 
If you get hold of a chap that ’s got no shame nor con- 
science to stop him, you must try what you can do by 
bunging his eyes up.” 

Arthur did not laugh, for he was preoccupied with some 
thought that made him say presently, — 

“ I should think now, Adam, you never have any strug- 

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ADAM BEDE 


gles within yourself. I fancy you would master a wish that 
you had made up your mind it was not quite right to in- 
dulge, as easily as you would knock down a drunken fellow 
who was quarrelsome with you. I mean, you are never 
shilly-shally, — first making up your mind that you won’t 
do a thing, and then doing it after all ? ” 

“ Well,” said Adam, slowly, after a moment’s hesitation, 
— “ no. I don’t remember ever being see-saw in that way, 
when I ’d made my mind up, as you say, that a thing was 
wrong. It takes the taste out o’ my mouth for things, when 
I know I should have a heavy conscience after ’em. I ’ve 
seen pretty clear, ever since I could cast up a sum, as you 
can never do what ’s wrong without breeding sin and trouble 
more than you can ever see. It ’s like a bit o’ bad work- 
manship, — you never see th’ end o’ the mischief it ’ll do. 
And it ’s a poor lookout to come into the world to make 
your fellow-creatures worse off instead o’ better. But 
there ’s a difference between the things folks call wrong. 
I ’m not for making a sin of every little fool’s trick, or bit 
o’ nonsense anybody may be let into, like some o’ them 
dissenters. And a man may have two minds, whether it 
is n’t worth while to get a bmise or two for the sake of a 
bit o’ fun. But it is n’t my way to be see-saw about any- 
thing ; I think my fault lies th’ other way. When I ’ve said 
a thing, if it ’s only to myself, it ’s hard for me to go back.” 

“ Yes, that ’s just what I expected of you,” said Arthur. 
“ You ’ve got an iron will, as well as an iron arm. But 
however strong a man’s resolution may be, it costs him 
something to carry it out, now and then. We may de- 
termine not to gather any cherries, and keep our hands 
sturdily in our pockets, but we can’t prevent our mouths 
from watering.” 

“ That ’s true, sir ; but there ’s nothing like settling with 
ourselves as there ’s a deal we must do without i’ this life. 
It ’s no use looking on life as if it was Treddles’on fair, where 
folks only go to see shows and get fairings. If we do, we 
shall find it different. But where ’s the use o’ me talking 
to you, sir? You know better than I do.” 

“ I ’m not so sure of that, Adam. You ’ve had four or 
five years of experience more than I ’ve had, and I think 

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your life has been a better school to you than college has 
been to me” 

“ Why, sir, you seem to think o' college something like 
what Bartle Massey does. He says college mostly makes 
people like bladders, — just good for nothing but t' hold the 
stuff as is poured into 'em. But he 's got a tongue like a 
sharp blade, Bartle has ; it never touches anything but it . 
cuts. Here 's the turning, sir. I must bid you good morn- 
ing, as you 're going to the Rectory." 

“ Good-by, Adam, good-by." 

Arthur gave his horse to the groom at the Rectory gate, 
and walked along the gravel towards the door which opened 
on the garden. He knew that the Rector always breakfasted 
in his study , and the study lay on the left hand of this door, 
opposite the dining-room. It was a small low room, be- 
longing to the old part of the house, — dark with the sombre 
covers of the books that lined the walls ; yet it looked very 
cheery this morning as Arthur reached the open window. 
For the morning sun fell aslant on the great glass globe 
with gold-fish in it, which stood on a scagliola pillar in 
front of the ready-spread bachelor breakfast-table, and by 
the side of this breakfast-table was a group which would 
have made any room enticing. In the crimson damask 
easy-chair sat Mr. Irwine, with that radiant freshness which 
he always had when he came from his morning toilet ; his 
finely formed plump white hand was playing along Juno's 
brown curly back ; and close to Juno’s tail, which was 
wagging with calm matronly pleasure, the two brown pups 
were rolling over each other in an ecstatic duet of worry- 
ing noises. On a cushion a little removed sat Pug, with 
the air of a maiden lady, who looked on these familiarities 
as animal weaknesses, which she made as little show as pos- 
sible of observing. On the table, at Mr. Irwine’s elbow, lay 
the first volume of the Foulis ^schylus, which Arthur knew 
well by sight ; and the .silver coffee-pot, which Carroll was 
bringing in, sent forth a fragrant steam which completed 
the delights of a bachelor breakfast. 

‘‘Hallo, Arthur, that's a good fellow! You're ^ust in 
time,” said Mr. Irwine, as Arthur paused and stepped in 
over the* low window-sill. “ Carroll, we shall want more 

169 


ADAM BEDE 


coffee and eggs, and have n’t you got som?cold fowl for us 
to eat with that ham? Why, this is like old days, Arthur; 
you have n’t been to breakfast with me these five years.” 

“ It was a tempting morning for a ride before breakfast,” 
said Arthur ; “ and I used to like breakfasting with you so 
when I was reading with you. My grandfather is always a 
few degrees colder at breakfast than at any other hour in 
the day. I think his morning bath does n’t agree with him.” 

Arthur was anxious not to imply that he came with any 
special purpose. He had no sooner found himself in Mr. 
Irwine’s presence than the confidence which he had thought 
quite easy before, suddenly appeared the most difficult thing 
in the world to him, and at the very moment of shaking- 
hands he saw his purpose in quite a new light. How could 
he make Irwine understand his position unless he told him 
those little scenes in the wood ; and how could he tell them 
without looking like a fool? And then his weakness in 
coming back from Gawaine’s, and doing the very opposite 
of what he intended ! Irwine would think him a shilly- 
shally fellow ever after. However, it must come out in an 
unpremeditated way ; the conversation might lead up to it. 

“ I like breakfast-time better than any other moment in 
the day,” said Mr. Irwine. “No dust has settled on one’s 
mind then, and it presents a clear mirror to the rays of 
things. I always have a favourite book by me at breakfast, 
and I enjoy the bits I pick up then so much that regularly 
every morning it seems to me as if I should certainly be- 
come studious again. But presently Dent brings up a poor 
fellow who has killed a hare, and when I ’ve got through 
my ‘ justicing,’ as Carroll calls it, I ’m inclined for a ride 
round the glebe, and on my way back I meet with the mas- 
ter of the workhouse, who has got a long story of a mutinous 
pauper to tell me ; and so the day goes on, and I ’m always 
the same lazy fellow before evening sets in. Besides, one 
wants the stimulus of sympathy, and I have never had that 
since poor D’Oyley left Treddleston. If you had stuck to 
your books well, you rascal, I should have had a pleasanter 
prospect before me ; but scholarship does n’t run in your 
family blood.” 

“ No, indeed. It ’s well if I can remember a little inap- 
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^ ' 

plicable Latin to adorn my maiden speech in Parliament 
six or seven years hence. ‘ Cras ingens iterabimus aequor/ 
and a few shreds of that sort, will perhaps stick to me, and 
I shall arrange my opinions so as to introduce them. But 
I don’t think a knowledge of the classics is a pressing want 
to a country gentleman ; as far as I can see, he ’d much 
better have a knowledge of manures. I Ve been reading 
your friend Arthur Young’s books lately, and there ’s noth- 
ing I should like better than to carry out some of his ideas 
in putting the farmers on a better management of their 
land ; and, as he says, making what was a wild country, all 
of the same dark hue, bright and variegated with corn and 
cattle. My grandfather will never let me have any power 
while he lives ; but there ’s nothing I should like better than 
to undertake the Stonyshire side of the estate, — it ’s in a 
dismal condition, — and set improvements on foot, and 
gallop about from one place to another and overlook them. 
I should like to know all the labourers, and see them touch- 
ing their hats to me with a look of good-will.” 

“ Bravo, Arthur ! A man who has no feeling for the 
classics could n’t make a better apology for coming into 
the world than by increasing the quantity of food to main- 
tain scholars, — and rectors who appreciate scholars. And 
whenever you enter on your career of model landlord may 
I be there to see! You ’il want a portly rector to complete 
the picture, and take his tithe of all the respect and honour 
you get by your hard work. Only don’t set your heart too 
strongly on the good-will you are to get in consequence. 
I ’m not sure that men are the fondest of those who try to 
be useful to them. You know Gawaine has got the curses 
of the whole neighbourhood upon him about that enclo- 
sure. You must make it quite clear to your mind which 
you are most bent upon, old boy, — popularity or usefulness, 
— else you may happen to miss both.” 

'' Oh ! Gawaine is harsh in his manners ; he does n’t 
make himself personally agreeable to his tenants. I 
don’t believe there ’s anything you can’t prevail on peo- 
ple to do with kindness. For my part, I could n’t live in a 
neighbourhood where I was not respected and beloved ; and 
it ’s very pleasant to go among the tenants here, they seem 

171 


ADAM BEDE 


all so well inclined to me. I suppose it seems only the other 
day to them since I was a little lad, riding on a pony about 
as big as a sheep. And if fair allowances were made to them, 
and their buildings attended to, one could persuade them 
to farm on a better plan, stupid as they are.” 

“ Then mind you fall in love in the right place, and don’t 
get a wife who will drain your purse and make you niggard- 
ly in spite of yourself. My mother and I have a little dis- 
cussion about you sometimes. She says, ‘ I ’ll never risk 
a single prophecy on Arthur until I see the woman he falls 
in love with.’ She thinks your lady-love will rule you as 
the moon rules the tides. But I feel bound to stand up 
for you, as my pupil, you know ; and I maintain that you ’re 
not of that watery quality. So mind you don’t disgrace my 
judgment.” 

Arthur winced under this speech, for keen old Mrs. Ir- 
wine’s opinion about him had the disagreeable effect of a 
sinister omen. This, to be sure, was only another reason 
for persevering in his intention and getting an additional 
security against himself. Nevertheless, at this point in the 
conversation he was conscious of increased disinclination to 
tell his story about Hetty. He was of an impressible nature, 
and lived a great deal in other people’s opinions and feel- 
ings concerning himself; and the mere fact that he was in 
the presence of an intimate friend, who had not the slightest 
notion that he had had any such serious internal struggle 
as he came to confide, rather shook his own belief in the 
seriousness of the struggle. It was not, after all, a thing 
to make a fuss about ; and what could Irwine do for him 
that he could not do for himself? He would go to Eagle- 
dale in spite of Meg’s lameness, — go on Rattler, and let 
Pym follow as well as he could on the old hack. That was 
his thought as he sugared his coffee ; but the next minute, 
as he was lifting the cup to his lips, he remembered how 
thoroughly he had made up his mind last night to tell Ir- 
wine. No ! he would not be vacillating again, — he would 
do what he had meant to do, this time. So it would be well 
not to let the personal tone of the conversation altogether 
drop. If they went to quite indifferent topics, his difficulty 
would be heightened. It had required no noticeable pause 

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for this rush and rebound of feeling, before he answered, — 

“ But I think it is hardly an argument against a man’s 
general strength of character, that he should be apt to be 
mastered by love. A fine constitution does n’t insure one 
against small-pox or any other of those inevitable diseases. 
A man may be very firm in other matters, and yet be under 
a sort of witchery from a woman.” 

‘^Yes; but there’s this difference between love and 
small-pox, or bewitchment either, — that if you detect the 
disease at any early stage, and try change of air, there is 
every chance of complete escape without any further de- 
velopment of symptoms. And there are certain alterative 
doses which a man may administer to himself by keeping 
unpleasant consequences before his mind: this gives you a 
sort of smoked glass through which you may look at the 
resplendent fair one and discern her true outline; though 
I ’m afraid, by the by, the smoked glass is apt to be missing 
just at the moment it is most wanted. I dare say, now, even 
a man fortified with a knowledge of the classics might be 
lured into an imprudent marriage, in spite of the warning 
given him by the chorus in the Prometheus.” 

The smile that flitted across Arthur’s face was a faint one, 
and instead of following Mr. Irwine’s playful lead, he said 
quite seriously: “Yes, that’s the worst of it. It’s a des- 
perately vexatious thing, that after all one’s reflections and 
quiet determinations, we should be ruled by moods that one 
can’t calculate on beforehand. I don’t think a man ought 
to be blamed so much if he is betrayed into doing things 
in that way, in spite of his resolutions.” 

“ Ah, but the moods lie in his nature, my boy, just as 
much as his reflections did, and more. A man can never 
do anything at variance with his own nature. He carries 
within him the germ of his most exceptional action; and 
if we wise people make eminent fools of ourselves on any 
particular occasion, we must endure the legitimate con- 
clusion that we carry a few grains of folly to our ounce of 
wisdom.” 

“ Well, but one may be betrayed into doing things by a 
combination of circumstances, which one might never have 
done otherwise.” 


173 


ADAM BEDE 


“ Why, yes, a man can’t very weil steal a bank-note un- 
less the bank-note lies within convenient reach ; but he 
won’t make us think him an honest man because he begins 
to howl at the bank-note for falling in his way.” 

“ But surely you don’t think a man who struggles against 
a temptation into which he falls at last, as bad as the man 
who never struggles at all ? ” 

“ No, certainly ; I pity him in proportion to his strug- 
gles, for they foreshadow the inward suf¥ering which is the 
worst form of Nemesis. Consequences are unpitying. Our 
deeds carry their terrible consequences, quite apart from any 
fluctuations that went before, — consequences that are 
hardly ever confined to ourselves; and it is best to fix our 
minds on that certainty, instead of considering what may 
be the elements of excuse for us. But 1 never knew you so 
inclined for moral discussion, Arthur? Is it some danger 
of your own that you are considering in this philosophical, 
general way ? ” 

In asking this question, Mr. Irwine pushed his plate away, 
threw himself back in his chair, and looked straight at Ar- 
thur. He really suspected that Arthur wanted to tell him 
something, and thought of smoothing the way for him by 
this direct question. But he was mistaken. Brought sud- 
denly and involuntarily to the brink of confession, Arthur 
shrank back, and felt less disposed towards it than ever. 
The conversation had taken a more serious tone than he 
had intended ; it would quite mislead Irwine, — he would 
imagine there was a deep passion for Hetty, while there was 
no such thing. He was conscious of colouring, and was 
annoyed at his boyishness. 

“ Oh, no, no danger,” he said as indifferently as he could. 
“ I don’t know that I am more liable to irresolution than 
other people; only there are little incidents now and then 
that set one speculating on what might happen in the 
future.” 

Was there a motive at work under this strange reluc- 
tance of Arthur’s which had a sort of back-stairs influence, 
not admitted to himself? Our mental business is carried on 
much in the same way as the business of the State : a great 
deal of hard work is done by agents who are not acknowl- 


174 


LINKS 


edged. In a piece of machinery, too, I believe there is 
often a small unnoticeable wheel which has a great deal to 
do with the motion of the large obvious ones. Possibly 
there was some such unrecognized agent secretly busy in 
Arthur’s mind at this moment ; possibly it was the fear lest 
he might hereafter find the fact of having made a confession 
to the Rector a serious annoyance, in case he should not 
be able quite to carry out his good resolutions?"* I dare not 
assert that it was not so. The human soul is a very com- 
plex thing. 

The idea of Hetty had just crossed Mr. Irwine’s mind as 
he looked inquiringly at Arthur; but his disclaiming, in- 
different answer confirmed the thought which had quickly 
followed, — that there could be nothing serious in that 
direction. There was no probability that Arthur ever saw 
her except at church, and at her own home under the eye 
of Mrs. Poyser; and the hint he had given Arthur about 
her the other day had no more serious meaning than to pre- 
vent him from noticing her so as to rouse the little chit’s 
vanity, and in this way perturb the rustic drama of her life. 
Arthur would soon join his regiment, and be far away : no, 
there could be no danger in that quarter, even if Arthur’s 
character had not been a strong security against it. His 
honest, patronizing pride in the good-will and respect of 
everybody about him was a safeguard even against foolish 
romance, still more against a lower kind of folly. If there 
had been anything special on Arthur’s mind in the previous 
conversation, it was clear he was not inclined to enter into 
details, and Mr. Irwine was too delicate to imply even a 
friendly curiosity. He perceived a change of subject would 
be welcome, and said, — 

By the way, Arthur, at your colonel’s birthday fHe 
there were some transparencies that made a great effect in 
honour of Britannia, and Pitt, and the Loamshire Militia, 
and above all, the ^ generous youth,’ the hero of the day. 
Don’t you think you should get up something of the same 
sort to astonish our weak minds? ” 

The opportunity was gone. While Arthur was hesitating, 
the rope to which he might have clung had drifted away, — 
he must trust now to his own swimming. 

175 


i 


ADAM BEDE 


In ten minutes from that time Mr. Irwine was called for 
on business; and Arthur, bidding him good-by, mounted 
his horse again with a sense of dissatisfaction, which he tried 
to quell by determining to set off for Eagledale without an 
hour’s delay. 


BOOK 11. 


CHAPTER XVII. 

IN WHICH THE STORY PAUSES A LITTLE. 

T his Rector of Broxton is little better than a pagan ! ” 
I hear one of my readers exclaim. “ How much 
more edifying it would have been if you had made him give 
Arthur some truly spiritual advice! You might have put 
into his mouth the most beautiful things, — quite as good 
as reading a sermon.” 

Certainly I could, if I held it the highest vocation of the 
novelist to represent things as they never have been and 
never will be. I'hen, of course, I might refashion life and 
character entirely after my own liking; I might select the 
most unexceptionable type of clergyman, and put my own 
admirable opinions into his mouth on all occasions. But it 
happens, on the contrary, that my strongest effort is to 
avoid any such arbitrary picture, and to give a faithful ac- 
count of men and things as they have mirrored themselves 
in my mind. The mirror is doubtless defective ; the outlines 
will sometimes be disturbed, the reflection faint or con- 
fused ; but I feel as much bound to tell you as precisely as 
I can what that reflection is, as if I were in the witness-box 
narrating my experience on oath. 

Sixty years ago — it is a long time, so no wonder things 
have changed — all clergymen were not zealous ; indeed 
there is reason to believe that the number of zealous clergy- 
men was small, and it is probable that if one among the 
small minority had owned the livings of Broxton and Hay- 
slope in the year 1799, you would have liked him no better 
than you like Mr. Irwine. Ten to one, you would have 
thought him a tasteless, indiscreet, methodistical man. It 
is so very rarely that facts hit that nice medium required 


ADAM BEDE 


our own enlightened opinions and refined taste! Per- 
haps you will say, “ Do improve the facts a little, then ; 
make them more accordant with those correct views which 
it is our privilege to possess. The world is not just what 
we like; do touch it up with a tasteful pencil, and make 
believe it is not quite such a mixed, entangled affair. Let 
all people who hold unexceptionable opinions act unexcep- 
tionably. Let your most faulty characters always be on 
the wrong side, and your virtuous ones on the right. Then 
we shall see at a glance whom we are to condemn, and 
whom we are to approve. Then we shall be able to admire, 
without the slightest disturbance of our prepossessions; we 
shall hate and despise with that true ruminant relish which 
belongs to undoubting confidence.’’ 

But, my good friend, what will you do then with your 
fellow-parishioner who opposes your husband in the ves- 
try? — with your newly appointed vicar, whose style of 
preaching you find painfully below that of his regretted 
predecessor? — with the honest servant who worries your 
soul with her one failing? — with your neighbour, Mrs. 
Green, who was really kind to you in your last illness, but 
has said several ill-natured things about you since your 
convalescence ? — nay, with your excellent husband himself, 
who has other irritating habits besides that of not wiping 
his shoes? These fellow-mortals, every one, must be ac- 
cepted as they are, — you can neither straighten their noses, 
nor brighten their wit, nor rectify their dispositions ; and it 
is these people — amongst whom your life is passed — that 
it is needful you should tolerate, pity, and love; it is these 
more or less ugly, stupid, inconsistent people, whose move- 
ments of goodness you should be able to admire, for whom 
you should cherish all possible hopes, all possible patience. 
And I would not, even if I had the choice, be the clever 
novelist who could create a world so much better than this, 
in which we get up in the morning to do our daily work, 
that you would be likely to turn a harder, colder eye on the 
dusty streets and the common green fields, — on the real 
breathing men and women, who can be chilled by your in- 
difference or injured by your prejudice ; who can be cheered 

178 


IN WHICH THE STORY PAUSES A LITTLE 


and helped onward by your fellow-feeling, your forbearance, 
your outspoken, brave justice. 

So I am content to tell my simple story, without trying 
to make things seem better than they were : dreading noth- 
ing, indeed, but falsity, which, in spite of one’s best efforts, 
there is reason to dread. Falsehood is so easy, truth so 
difficult. The pencil is conscious of a delightful facility in 
drawing a griffin, — the longer the claws, and the larger the 
wings, the better ; but that marvellous facility which we 
mistook for genius is apt to forsake us when we want to 
draw a real, unexaggerated lion. Examine your words well, 
and you will find that even when you have no motive to be 
false, it is a very hard thing to say the exact truth, even 
about your own immediate feelings, — much harder than 
to say something fine about them which is not the exact 
truth. 

It is for this rare, precious quality of truthfulness that I 
delight in many Dutch paintings, which lofty-minded people 
despise. I find a source of delicious sympathy in these faith- 
ful pictures of a monotonous, homely existence, which has 
been the fate of so many more among my fellow-mortals 
than a life of pomp, or of absolute indigence, of tragic suf- 
fering or of world-stirring actions. I turn, without shrink- 
ing, from cloud-borne angels, from prophets, sibyls, and 
heroic warriors, to an old woman bending over her flower- 
pot or eating her solitary dinner, while the noonday light, 
softened perhaps by a screen of leaves, falls on her mob-cap, 
and just touches the rim of her spinning-wheel and her 
stone jug, and all those cheap common things which are 
the precious necessaries of life to her; or I turn to that 
village wedding, kept between four brown walls, where an 
awkward bridegroom opens the dance with a high-shoul- 
dered, broad-faced bride, while elderly and middle-aged 
friends look on, with very irregular noses and lips, and 
probably with quart-pots in their hands, but with an ex- 
pression of unmistakable contentment and good-will. 
'‘Foh!” says my idealistic friend, “what vulgar details! 
What good is there in taking all these pains to give an 
exact likeness of old women and clowns? What a low phase 
of life ! — what clumsy, ugly people ! ” 

179 


ADAM BEDE 

But bless US, things may be lovable that are not altogether 
handsome, I hope? I am not at all sure that the majority 
of the human race have not been ugly; and even among 
those “ lords of their kind,” the British, squat figures, ill- 
shapen nostrils, and dingy complexions are not startling ex- 
ceptions. Yet there is a great deal of family love amongst 
us. I have a friend or two whose class of features is such 
that the Apollo curl on the summit of their brows would be 
decidedly trying ; yet to my certain knowledge tender hearts 
have beaten for them, and their miniatures — flattering, but 
still not lovely — are kissed in secret by motherly lips. I 
have seen many an excellent matron, who could never in 
her best days have been handsome, and yet she had a packet 
of yellow love-letters in a private drawer, and sweet chil- 
dren showered kisses on her sallow cheeks. And I believe 
there have been plenty of young heroes, of middle stature and 
feeble beards, who have felt quite sure they could never love 
anything more insignificant than a Diana, and yet have 
found themselves in middle life happily settled with a wife 
who waddles. Yes! thank God; human feeling is like the 
mighty rivers that bless the earth: it does not wait for 
beauty, — it flows with resistless force, and brings beauty 
with it. 

All honour and reverence to the divine beauty of form ! 
Let us cultivate it to the utmost in men, women, and chil- 
dren, — in our gardens and in our houses. But let us love 
that other beauty too, which lies in no secret of proportion, 
but in the secret of deep human sympathy. Paint us an 
angel, if you can, with a floating violet robe, and a face 
paled by the celestial light ; paint us yet oftener a Madonna, 
turning her mild face upward and opening her arms to wel- 
come the divine glory; but do not impose on us any aes- 
thetic rules which shall banish from the region of Art those 
old women scraping carrots with their work-worn hands, 
those heavy clowns taking holiday in a dingy pot-house, 
those rounded backs and stupid weather-beaten faces that 
have bent over the spade and done the rough work of the 
world, — those homes with their tin pans, their brown 
pitchers', their rough curs, and their clusters of onions. In 
this world there are so many of these common coarse peo- 

l8o 


IN WHICH THE STORY PAUSES A LITTLE 


pie, who have no picturesque, sentimental wretchedness ! It 
is so needful we should remember their existence, else we 
may happen to leave them quite out of our religion and 
philosophy, and frame lofty theories which only fit a world 
of extremes. Therefore let Art always remind us of them ; 
therefore let us always have men ready to give the loving 
pains of a life to the faithful representing of commonplace 
things, — men who see beauty in these commonplace things, 
and delight in showing how kindly the light of heaven falls 
on them. There are few prophets in the world, few sub- 
limely beautiful women, few heroes. I can’t afford to give 
all my love and reverence to such rarities; I want a great 
deal of those feelings for my every-day fellow-men, espe- 
cially for the few in the foreground of the great multitude, 
whose faces I know, whose hands I touch, for whom I have 
to make way with kindly courtesy. Neither are picturesque 
lazzaroni or romantic criminals half so frequent as your 
common labourer who gets his own bread, and eats it vul- 
garly but creditably with his own pocket-knife. It is more 
needful that I should have a fibre of sympathy connecting 
me with that vulgar citizen who weighs out my sugar in a 
vilely assorted cravat and waistcoat, than with the hand- 
somest rascal in red scarf and green feathers ; more need- 
ful that my heart should swell with loving admiration at 
some trait of gentle goodness in the faulty people who sit 
at the same hearth with me, or in the clergyman of my own 
parish, who is perhaps rather too corpulent, and in other 
respects is not an Oberlin or a Tillotson, than at the deeds 
of heroes whom I shall never know except by hearsay, or 
at the sublimest abstract of all clerical graces that was ever 
conceived by an able novelist. 

And so I come back to Mr. Irwine, with whom I desire 
you to be in perfect charity, far as he may be from satisfy- 
ing your demands on the clerical character. Perhaps you 
think he was not — as he ought to have been — a living 
demonstration of the benefits attached to a national church ? 
But I am not sure of that ; at least I know that the people 
in Broxton and Hayslope would have been very sorry to 
part with their clergyman, and that most faces brightened 
at his approach ; and until it can be proved that hatred is a 

i8i 


ADAM BEDE 


better thing for the soul than love, I must believe that Mr. 
Irwine's influence in his parish was a more wholesome one 
than that of the zealous Mr. Ryde, who came there twenty 
years afterwards, when Mr. Irwine had been gathered to 
his fathers. It is true, Mr. Ryde insisted strongly on the 
doctrines of the Reformation, visited his flock a great deal 
in their own homes, and was severe in rebuking the aberra- 
tions of the flesh, — put a stop, indeed, to the Christmas 
rounds of the church singers, as promoting drunkenness, 
and too light a handling of sacred things. But I gathered 
from Adam Bede, to whom I talked of these matters in his 
old age, that few clergymen could be less successful in 
winning the hearts of their parishioners than Mr. Ryde. 
They learned a great many notions about doctrine from 
him, so that almost every church-goer under fifty began to 
distinguish as well between the genuine gospel and what 
did not come precisely up to that standard, as if he had 
been born and bred a Dissenter; and for some time after 
his arrival there seemed to be quite a religious movement 
in that quiet rural district. “ But,” said Adam, “ I Ve seen 
pretty clear, ever since I was a young un, as religion ’s 
something else besides notions. It is n’t notions sets peo- 
ple doing the right thing, — it ’s feelings. It ’s the same 
with the notions in religion as it is with math’matics, — 
a man may be able to work problems straight off in ’s head 
as he sits by the fire and smokes his pipe ; but if he has 
to make a machine or a building, he must have a will and a 
resolution, and love something else better than his own ease. 
Somehow the congregation began to fall off, and people 
began to speak light o’ Mr. Ryde. I believe he meant right 
at bottom ; but, you see, he was sourish-tempered, and was 
for beating down prices with the people as worked for him ; 
and his preaching would n’t go down well with that sauce. 
And he wanted to be like my lord judge i’ the parish, pun- 
ishing folks for doing wrong ; and he scolded ’em from the 
pulpit as if he ’d been a Ranter, and yet he could n’t abide 
the Dissenters, and was a deal more set against ’em than 
Mr. Irwine was. And then he did n’t keep within his in- 
come, for he seemed to think at first go-off that six hundred 
a-year was to make him as big a man as Mr. Donnithorne : 

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IN WHICH THE STORY PAUSES A LITTLE 


that ’s a sore mischief I ’ve often seen with the poor curates 
jumping into a bit of a living all of a sudden. Mr. Ryde 
was a deal thought on at a distance, I believe, and he wrote 
books; but as for mathematics and the natur o’ things, he 
was as ignorant as a woman. He was very knowing about 
doctrines, and used to call ’em the bulwarks of the Reforma- 
tion ; but I ’ve always mistrusted that sort o’ learning as 
leaves folks foolish and unreasonable about business. Now 
Mester Irwine was as different as could be : as quick ! — he 
understood what you meant in a minute; and he knew all 
about building, and could see when you ’d made a good 
job. And he behaved as much like a gentleman to the 
farmers and th’ old women and the labourers as he did to 
the gentry. You never saw him interfering and scolding, 
and trying to play th’ emperor. Ah ! he was a fine man as 
ever you set eyes on ; and so kind to ’s mother and sisters. 
That poor sickly Miss Anne, — he seemed to think more of 
her than of anybody else in the world. There was n’t a soul 
in the parish had a word to say against him : and his serv- 
ants stayed with him till they were so old and pottering he 
had to hire other folks to do their work.” 

Well,” I said, “ that was an excellent way of preaching 
in the week-days; but I dare say, if your old friend Mr. 
Irwine were to come to life again, and get into the pulpit 
next Sunday, you would be rather ashamed that he didn’t 
preach better after all your praise of him.” 

“ Nay, nay,” said Adam, broadening his chest and throw- 
ing himself back in his chair, as if he were ready to meet all 
inferences, nobody has ever heard me say Mr. Irwine was 
much of a preacher. He did n’t go into deep speritial ex- 
perience ; and I know there ’s a deal in a man’s inward life 
as you can’t measure by the square, and say, ' Do this and 
that ’ll follow,’ and ' Do that and this ’ll follow.’ There ’s 
things go on in the soul, and times when feelings come 
into you like a rushing mighty wind, as the Scripture says, 
and part your life in two a’most, so as you look back on 
yourself as if you was somebody else. Those are things as 
you can’t bottle up in a ‘ do this ’ and ^ do that ; ’ and I ’ll go 
so far with the strongest Methodist ever you ’ll find. That 
shows me there ’s deep speritial things in religion. You 

183 


ADAM BEDE 


can’t make much out wi’ talking about it, but you feel it. 
Mr. Irwine did n’t go into those things : he preached short 
moral sermons, and that was all. But then he acted pretty 
much up to what he said ; he did n’t set up for being so 
different from other folks one day, and then be as like ’em 
as two peas the next. And he made folks love him and re- 
spect him, and that was better nor stirring up their gall wi’ 
being over-busy. Mrs. Poyser used to say, — you know she 
would have her word about everything, — she said, Mr. 
Irwdne was like a good meal o’ victual, you were the better 
for him without thinking on it; and Mr. Ryde was like a 
dose o’ physic, he gripped you and worreted you, and after 
all he left you much the same.” 

“ But did n’t Mr. Ryde preach a great deal more about 
that spiritual part of religion that you talk of, Adam? 
Could n’t you get more out of his sermons than out of Mr. 
Irwine’s ? ” 

“ Eh, I knowna. He preached a deal about doctrines. 
But I ’ve seen pretty clear ever since I was a young un, as 
religion ’s something else besides doctrines and notions. I 
look at it as if the doctrines was like finding nimes for 
your feelings, so as you can talk of ’em when you ’ve never 
known ’em, just as a man may talk o’ tools when he knows 
their names, though he ’s never so much as seen ’em, still 
less handled ’em. I ’ve heard a deal o’ doctrine i’ my time, 
for I used to go after the Dissenting preachers along wi’ 
Seth, when I was a lad o’ seventeen, and got puzzling my- 
self a deal about th’ Arminians and the Calvinists. The 
Wesleyans, you know, are strong Arminians; and Seth, 
who could never abide anything harsh and was always for 
hoping the best, held fast by the Wesleyans from the very 
first; but I thought I could pick a hole or two in their 
notions, and I got disputing wi’ one o’ the class leaders 
down at Treddles’on, and harassed him so, first o’ this side 
and then o’ that, till at last he said, ‘ Young man, it ’s the 
devil making use o’ your pride and conceit as a weapon to 
war against the simplicity o’ the truth.’ I could n’t help 
laughing then ; but as I was going home, I thought the man 
was n’t far wrong. I began to see as all this weighing and 
sifting what this text means and that text means, and 

184 


IN WHICH THE STORY PAUSES A LITTLE 


whether folks are saved all by God’s grace, or whether there 
goes an ounce o’ their own will to ’t, was no part o’ real 
religion at all. You may talk o’ these things for hours on 
end, and you ’ll only be all the more coxy and conceited for 
’t. So I took to going nowhere but to church, and hearing 
nobody but Mr. Irwine ; for he said nothing but what was 
good, and what you ’d be the wiser for remembering. And 
I found it better for my soul to be humble before the mys- 
teries o’ God’s dealings, and not be making a clatter about 
what I could never understand. And they ’re poor, foolish 
questions, after all ; for what have we got either inside or 
outside of us but what comes from God ? If we ’ve got a 
resolution to do right, he gave it us, I reckon, first or last ; 
but I see plain enough we shall never do it without a reso- 
lution, and that ’s enough for me.” 

Adam, you perceive, v/as a warm admirer, perhaps a par- 
tial judge, of Mr. Irwine, as, happily, some of us still are 
of the people we have known familiarly. Doubtless it will 
be despised as a weakness by that lofty order of minds who 
pant after the ideal, and are oppressed by a general sense 
that their emotions are of too exquisite a character to find 
fit objects among their every-day fellow-men. I have often 
been favoured with the confidence of these select natures, 
and find them concur in the experience that great men are 
over-estimated and small men are insupportable; that if 
you would love a woman without ever looking back on your 
love as a folly, she must die while you are courting her; 
and if you would maintain the slightest belief in human 
heroism, you must never make a pilgrimage to see the 
hero. I confess I have often meanly shrunk from confessing 
to these accomplished and acute gentlemen what my own 
experience has been. I am afraid I have often smiled with 
hypocritical assent, and gratified them with an epigram on 
the fleeting nature of our illusions, which any one mod- 
erately acquainted with French literature can command at 
a moment’s notice. Human converse, I think some wise 
man has remarked, is not rigidly sincere. But I herewith 
discharge my conscience, and declare that I have had quite 
enthusiastic movements of admiration towards old gentle- 
men who spoke the worst English,, who were occasionally 

185 


ADAM BEDE 


fretful in their temper, and who had never moved in a higher 
sphere of influence than that of parish overseer; and that 
the way in which I have come to 'the conclusion that human 
nature is lovable — the way I have learnt something of its 
deep pathos, its sublime mysteries — has been by living a 
great deal among people more or less commonplace and 
vulgar, of whom you would perhaps hear nothing very sur- 
prising if you were to inquire about them in the neighbour- 
hoods where they dwelt. Ten to one most of the small shop- 
keepers in their vicinity saw nothing at all in them. For I 
have observed this remarkable coincidence, that the select 
natures who pant after the ideal, and find nothing in panta- 
loons or petticoats great enough to command their rever- 
ence and love, are curiously in unison with the narrowest 
and pettiest. For example, I have often heard Mr. Gedge, 
the landlord of the Royal Oak, who used to turn a blood- 
shot eye on his neighbours in the village of Shepperton, 
sum up his opinion of the people in his own parish, — and 
they were all the people he knew, — in these emphatic 
words : “ Ay, sir, I Ve said it often, and I ’ll say it again, 

they ’re a poor lot i’ this parish, — a poor lot, sir, big and 
little.” I think he had a dim idea that if he could migrate 
to a distant parish, he might find neighbours worthy of him ; 
and indeed he did subsequently transfer himself to the Sara- 
cen’s Head, which was doing a thriving business in the back 
street of a neighbouring market-town. But, oddly enough, 
he has found the people up that back street of precisely the 
same stamp as the inhabitants of Shepperton, — “a poor 
lot, sir, big and little; and them as comes for a go o’ gin 
are no better than them as comes for a pint o’ twopenny, — 
a poor lot.” 


CHAPTER XVIII. 

CHURCH. 

H etty, Hetty, don’t you know church begins at two, 
and it ’s gone half after one a’ready ? Have you 
got nothing better to think on this good Sunday, as poor 
old Thias Bede ’s to be put into the ground, and him 

i86 


CHURCH 


drownded i’ th' dead o’ the night, as it ’s enough to make 
one’s back run cold, but you must be ’dizening yourself as 
if there was a wedding istid of a funeral ? ” 

“ Well, aunt,” said Hetty, “ I can’t be ready so soon as 
everybody else, when 1 ’ve got Totty’s things to put on. 
And I ’d ever such work to make her stand still.” 

Hetty was coming downstairs, and Mrs. Poyser, in her 
plain bonnet and shawl, was standing below. If ever a girl 
looked as if she had been made of roses, that girl was Hetty 
in her Sunday hat and frock. For her hat was trimmed 
with pink, and her frock had pink spots, sprinkled on a 
white ground. There was nothing but pink and white about 
her, except in her dark hair and eyes and her little buckled 
shoes. Mrs. Poyser was provoked at herself^ for she could 
hardly keep from smiling, as any mortal is inclined to do 
at the sight of pretty, round things. So she turned without 
speaking, and joined the group outside the house door, 
followed by Hetty, whose heart was fluttering so at the 
thought of some one she expected to see at church, that she 
hardly felt the ground she trod on. 

And now the little procession set off. Mr. Poyser was 
in his Sunday suit of drab, with a red-and-green waistcoat, 
and a green watch-ribbon, having a large carnelian seal at- 
tached, pendent like a plumb-line from that promontory 
where his watch-pocket was situated; a silk handkerchief 
of a yellow tone round his neck ; and excellent gray ribbed 
stockings, knitted by Mrs. Poyser’s own hand, setting off 
the proportions of his leg. Mr. Poyser had no reason to 
be ashamed of his leg, and suspected that the growing abuse 
of top-boots and other fashions tending to disguise the 
nether limbs had their origin in a pitiable degeneracy of 
the human calf. Still less had he reason to be ashamed of 
his round jolly face, which was good-humour itself as he 
said, “ Come, Hetty ; come, little uns ! ” and giving his arm 
to his wife, led the way through the causeway gate into the 
yard. 

The '' little uns ” addressed were Marty and Tommy, boys 
of nine and seven, in little fustian tailed coats and knee- 
breeches, relieved by rosy cheeks and black eyes; looking 
as much like their father as a very small elephant is like a 

187 


ADAM BEDE 


very large one. Hetty walked between them, and behind 
came patient Molly, whose task it was to carry Totty 
through the yard, and over all the wet places on the road ; 
for Totty, having speedily recovered from her threatened 
fever, had insisted on going to church to-day, and espe- 
cially on wearing her red-and-black necklace outside her 
tippet. And there were many wet places for her to be car- 
ried over this afternoon, for there had been heavy showers 
in the morning, though now the clouds had rolled off and 
lay in towering silvery masses on the horizon. 

You might have known it was Sunday if you had only 
walked up in the farmyard. The cocks and hens seemed to 
know it, and made only crooning, subdued noises ; the very 
bull-dog looked less savage, as if he would have been satis- 
fied with a smaller bite than usual. The sunshine seemed to 
call all things to rest and not to labour ; it was asleep itself 
on the moss-grown cow-shed ; on the group of white ducks 
nestling together with their bills tucked under their wings ; 
on the old black sow stretched languidly on the straw, while 
her largest young one found an excellent spring-bed on his 
mother’s fat ribs ; on Alick, the shepherd, in his new smock- 
frock, taking an uneasy siesta, half sitting, half standing, 
on the granary steps. Alick was of opinion that church, like 
other luxuries, was not to be indulged in often by a foreman 
who had the weather and the ewes on his mind. “ Church ! 
nay, — I ’n gotten summat else to think on,” was an 
answer which he often uttered in a tone of bitter significance 
that silenced further question. I feel sure Alick meant no 
irreverence ; indeed, I know that his mind was not of a 
speculative, negative cast, and he would on no account have 
missed going to church on Christmas Day, Easter Sunday, 
and “ Whissuntide.” But he had a general impression that 
public worship and religious ceremonies, like other non-pro- 
ductive employments, were intended for people who had 
leisure. 

There ’s father a-standing at the yard-gate,” said Martin 
Poyser. “ I reckon he wants to watch us down the field. 
It ’s wonderful what sight he has, and him turned seventy- 
five.” 

“ Ah, I often think it 's wi’ th’ old folks as it is wi’ the 
t88 


CHURCH 


babbies/^ said Mrs. Poyser ; “ they ^re satisfied wi^ looking, 
no matter what they ’re looking at. It ’s God A’mighty’s 
way o’ quietening ’em, I reckon, afore they go to sleep.” 

Old Martin opened the gate as he saw the family pro- 
cession approaching, and held it wide open, leaning on his 
stick, — pleased to do this bit o’ work ; for, like all old men 
whose life has been spent in labour, he liked to feel that he 
was still useful, — that there was a better crop of onions in 
the garden because he was by at the sowing, — and that the 
cows would be milked the better if he stayed at home on a 
Sunday afternoon to look on. He always went to church on 
Sacrament Sundays, but not very regularly at other times; 
on wet Sundays or whenever he had a touch of rheumatism, 
he used to read the three first chapters of Genesis instead. 

‘‘ They ’ll ha’ putten Thias Bede i’ the ground afore ye 
get to the churchyard,” he said, as his son came up. It 
’ud ha’ been better luck if they ’d ha’ buried him i’ the fore- 
noon, when the rain was failin’ ; there ’s no likelihoods of 
a drop now; an’ the moon lies like a boat there, dost see? 
That ’s a sure sign o’ fair weather, — there ’s a many as is 
false, but that ’s sure.” 

Ay, ay,” said the son, “ I ’m in hopes it ’ll hold up now.” 

“ Mind what the parson says, mind what the parson says, 
my lads,” said grandfather to the black-eyed youngsters in 
knee-breeches, conscious of a marble or two in their pockets, 
which they looked forward to handling a little, secretly, dur- 
ing the sermon. 

“ Dood-by, dandad,” said Totty. “ Me doin’ to church. 
Me dot my netlace on. Dive me a peppermint.” 

Grandad, shaking with laughter at this deep little 
wench,” slowly transferred his stick to his left hand which 
held the gate open, and slowly thrust his finger into the 
waistcoat-pocket on which Totty had fixed her eyes with 
a confident look of expectation. 

And when they were all gone, the old man leaned on the 
gate again, watching them across the lane along the Home 
Close, and through the far gate, till they disappeared be- 
hind a bend in the hedge. For the hedgerows in those days 
shut out one’s view, even on the better-managed farms; 
and this afternoon, the dog-roses were tossing out their pink 

189 


ADAM BEDE 


wreaths, the nightshade was in its yellow and purple glory, 
the pale honeysuckle grew out of reach, peeping high up out 
of a holly bush, and over all an ash or a sycamore every now 
and then threw its shadow across the path. 

There were acquaintances at other gates who had to move 
aside and let them pass : at the gate of the Homer Close there 
was half the dairy of cows standing one behind the other, 
extremely slow to understand that their large bodies might 
be in the way ; at the far gate there was the mare holding 
her head over the bars, and beside her the liver-coloured foal 
with its head towards its mother’s flank, apparently still much 
embarrassed by its own straddling existence. The way lay 
entirely through Mr. Poyser’s own fields till they reached 
the main road leading to the village, and he turned a keen 
eye on the stock and the crops as they went along, while 
Mrs.' Poyser was ready to supply a running commentary on 
them all. The woman who manages a dairy has a large 
share in making the rent, so she may well be allowed to 
have her opinion on stock and their keep,” — an exercise 
which strengthens her understanding so much that she finds 
herself able to give her husband advice on most other sub- 
jects. 

“ There ’s that short-horned Sally,” she said, as they 
entered the Home Close, and she caught sight of the meek 
beast that lay chewing the cud, and looking at her with a 
sleepy eye. I begin to hate the sight o’ the cow ; and I 
say now what I said three weeks ago, the sooner we get rid 
of her the better, for there ’s that little yallow cow as does n’t 
give half the milk, and yet I ’ve twice as much butter from 
her.” 

Why, thee ’t not like the women in general,” said Mr. 
Poyser ; they like the short-horns, as give such a lot o’ 
milk. There ’s Chowne’s wife wants him to buy no other 
sort.” 

“ What ’s it sinnify what Chowne’s wife likes ? — a poor 
soft thing, wi’ no more head-piece nor a sparrow. She ’d 
take a big cullender to strain her lard wi’, and then wonder 
as the scratchin’s run through. I ’ve seen enough of her 
to know as I ’ll niver take a servant from her house again, — 
all hugger-mugger, — and you’d niver know, when you 

190 


CHURCH 


went in, whether it was Monday or Friday, the wash drag- 
gin’ on to th’ end o’ the week; and as for her cheese, I 
know well enough it rose like a loaf in a tin last year. And 
then she talks o’ the weather bein’ i’ fault, as there ’s folks 
ud’ stand on their heads and then say the fault was i’ their 
boots.” 

“ Well, Chowne ’s been wanting to buy Sally, so we can 
get rid of her if thee lik’st,” said Mr. Poyser, secretly proud 
of his wife’s superior power of putting two and two together ; 
indeed, on recent market-days he had more than once 
boasted of her discernment in this very matter of short- 
horns. 

“ Ay, them as choose a soft for a wife may ’s well buy 
up the short-horns, for if you get your head stuck in a bog 
your legs may ’s well go after it. Eh ! talk o’ legs, there ’s 
legs for you,” Mrs. Poyser continued, as Totty, who had 
been set down now the road was dry, toddled on in front of 
her father and mother. ‘‘ There ’s shapes ! An’ she ’s got 
such a long foot, she ’ll be her father’s own child.” 

Ay, she ’ll be welly such a one as Hetty i’ ten years’ 
time, on’y she ’s got thy coloured eyes. I niver remember 
a blue eye i’ my family; my mother had eyes as black as 
sloes, just like Hetty’s.” 

“ The child ’ull be none the worse for having summat as 
is n’t like Hetty. An’ I ’m none for having her so over- 
pretty. Though for the matter o’ that, there ’s people wi’ 
light hair an’ blue eyes as pretty as them wi’ black. If 
Dinah had got a bit o’ colour in her cheeks, an’ did n’t stick 
that Methodist cap on her head, enough to frighten the 
cows, folks ’ud think her as pretty as Hetty.” 

‘‘Nay, nay,” said Mr. Poyser, with rather a contemptu- 
ous emphasis, “ thee dostna know the p’ints of a woman. 
The men ’ud niver run after Dinah as they would after 
Hetty.” 

“ What care I what the men ’ud run after ? It ’s well seen 
what choice the most of ’em know how to make, by the 
poor draggle-tails o’ wives you see, like bits o’ gauze ribbon, 
good for nothing when the colour ’s gone.” 

“ Well, well, thee canstna say but what I knowed how to 
make a choice when I married thee,” said Mr. Poyser, who 


ADAM BEDE 


usually settled little conjugal disputes by a compliment of 
this sort ; “ and thee wast twice as buxom as Dinah ten 
year ago.” 

“ I niver said as a woman had need to be ugly to make 
a good missis of a house. There ’s Chowne’s wife ugly 
enough to turn the milk an' save the rennet, but she 'll niver 
save nothing any other way. But as for Dinah, poor child, 
she 's niver likely to be buxom as long as she 'll make her 
dinner o' cake and water, for the sake o' giving to them as 
want. She provoked me past bearing sometimes ; and, as I 
told her, she went clean again’ the Scriptur', for that says, 
‘ Love your neighbour as yourself ; ' ‘ but,' I said, ‘ if you 
loved your neighbour no better nor you do yourself, Dinah, 
it 's little enough you 'd do for him. You 'd be thinking he 
might do well enough on a half-empty stomach.' Eh, I 
wonder where she is this blessed Sunday ! — sitting by that 
sick woman, I dare say, as’ she 'd set her heart on going to 
all of a sudden.'' 

“ Ah, it was a pity she should take such megrims into her 
head, when she might ha' stayed wi' us all summer, and 
eaten twice as much as she wanted, and it 'ud niver ha' been 
missed. She made no odds in th' house at all, for she sat 
as still at her sewing as a bird on the nest, and was uncom- 
mon nimble at running to fetch anything. If Hetty gets 
married, thee 'dst like to ha' Dinah wi' thee constant.'' 

It 's no use thinking o' that,” said Mrs. Poyser. “ You 
might as well beckon to the flying swallow as ask Dinah 
to come an' live here comfortable, like other folks. If any- 
thing could turn her, / should ha' turned her, for I 've talked 
to her for a hour on end, and scolded her too ; for she 's my 
own sister’s child, and it behoves me to do what I can for 
her. But eh, poor thng, as soon as she 'd said us ' good-by,' 
an’ got into the cart, an’ looked back at me with her pale 
face, as is welly like her aunt Judith come back from heaven, 
I begun to be frightened to think o' the set-downs I 'd given 
her ; for it comes over you sometimes as if she 'd a way o' 
knowing the rights o’ things more nor other folks have. 
But I 'll niver give in as that 's 'cause she 's a Methodist, 
no more nor a white calf 's white 'cause it eats out o’ the 
same bucket wi’ a black un.” 


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“ Nay,” said Mr. Poyser, with as near an approach to a 
snarl as his good-nature would allow ; “ I ’n no opinion o’ 
the Methodists. It 's on’y tradesfolks as turn Methodists ; 
you niver knew a farmer bitten wi’ them maggots. There ’s 
maybe a workman now an’ then, as is n’t over-clever at ’s 
work, takes to preachin’ an’ that, like Seth Bede. But you 
see Adam, as has got one o’ the best head-pieces hereabout, 
knows better ; he ’s a good Churchman, else I ’d never en- 
courage him for a sweetheart for Hetty.” 

“ Why, goodness me,” said Mrs. Poyser, who had looked 
back while her husband was speaking, look where Molly 
is with them lads ! They ’re the field’s length behind us. 
How could you let ’em do so, Hetty? Anybody might as 
well set a pictur to watch the children as you. Run back 
and tell ’em to come on.” 

Mr. and Mrs. Poyser were now at the end of the second 
field, so they set Totty on the top of one of the large stones 
forming the true Loamshire stile, and awaited the loiterers ; 
Totty observing with complacency, ‘‘ Dey naughty, naughty 
boys, — me dood.” 

The fact was that this Sunday walk through the fields 
was fraught with great excitement to Marty and Tommy, 
who saw a perpetual drama going on in the hedgerows, 
and could no more refrain from stopping and peeping than 
if they had been a couple of spaniels or terriers. Marty was 
quite sure he saw a yellowhammer on the boughs of the great 
ash, and while he was peeping, he missed the sight of a 
white-throated stoat, which had run across the path and 
was described with much fervour by the junior Tommy. 
Then there was a little greenfinch, just fledged, fluttering 
along the ground, and it seemed quite possible to catch it, 
till it managed to flutter under the blackberry bush. Hetty 
could not be got to give any heed to these things ; so Molly 
was called on for her ready sympathy, and peeped with open 
mouth wherever she was told, and said “ Lawks ! ” whenever 
she was expected to wonder. 

Molly hastened on with some alarm when Hetty had come 
back and called to them that her aunt was angry ; but 
Marty ran on first, shouting, “We ’ve found the speckled 

13 193 


ADAM BEDE 


turkey’s nest, mother ! ” with the instinctive confidence that 
people who bring good news are never in fault. 

“ Ah,” said Mrs. Poyser, really forgetting all discipline in 
this pleasant surprise, “that’s a good lad; why, where 
is it?” 

“ Down in ever such a hole, under the hedge. I saw it 
first, looking after the greenfinch, and she sat on th’ nest.” 

“You didn’t frighten ■ her, I hope,” said the mother, 
“ else she ’ll forsake it.” 

“No, I went away as still as still, and whispered to Molly, 
— didn’t I, Molly?” 

“ Well, well, now come on,” said Mrs. Poyser, “ and walk 
before father and mother, and take your little sister by the 
hand. We must go straight on now. Good boys don’t look 
after the birds of a Sunday.” 

“ But, mother,” said Marty, “ you said you ’d give half- 
a-crown to find the speckled turkey’s nest. May n’t I 
have the half-crown put into my money-box ? ” 

“We ’ll see about that, my lad, if you walk along now, 
like a good boy.” 

The father and mother exchanged a significant glance of 
amusement at their eldest-born’s acuteness ; but on 
Tommy’s round face there was a cloud. 

“ Mother,” he said, half crying, “ Marty ’s got ever so 
much more money in his box nor I ’ve got in mine.” 

“ Munny, me want half-a-toun in my. bots,” said Totty. 

“ Hush, hush, hush ! ” said Mrs. Poyser ; “ did ever any- 
body hear such naughty children? Nobody shall ever see 
their money-boxes any more, if they don’t make haste and 
go on to church.” 

This dreadful threat had the desired effect, and through 
the two remaining fields the three pair of small legs trotted 
on without any serious interruption, notwithstanding a 
small pond full of tadpoles alias “ bullheads,” which the lads 
looked at wistfully. 

The damp hay that must be scattered and turned afresh 
to-morrow was not a cheering sight to Mr. Poyser, who 
during hay and corn harvest had often some mental strug- 
gles as to the benefits of a day of rest ; but no temptation 
would have induced him to carry on any field work, how- 

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ever early in the morning, on a Sunday ; for had not Michael 
Holdsworth had a pair of oxen “ sweltered ” while he was 
ploughing on Good Friday ? That was a demonstration that 
work on sacred days was a wicked thing ; and with wicked- 
ness of any sort Martin Poyser was quite clear that he 
would have nothing to do, since money got by such means 
would never prosper. 

It a’ most makes your fingers itch to be at the hay now 
the sun shines so,” he observed, as they passed through the 

Big Meadow.” “ But it ’s poor foolishness to think o’ 
saving by going against your conscience. There ’s that Jim 
Wakefield, as they used to call ‘ Gentleman Wakefield,’ used 
to do the same of a Sunday as o’ week-days, and took no 
heed to right or wrong, as if there was nayther God nor 
devil. An’ what ’s he come to ? Why, I saw him myself last 
market-day a-carrying a basket wi’ oranges in ’t.” 

“ Ah, to be sure,” said Mrs. Poyser, emphatically, “ you 
make but a poor trap to catch luck if you go and bait it wi’ 
wickedness. The money as is got so ’s like to bum holes i’ 
your pocket. I ’d niver wish us to leave our lads a sixpence 
but what was got i’ the rightful way. And as , for the 
weather, there ’s One above makes it, and we must put up 
wi’ ’t : it ’s nothing of a plague to what the wenches are.” 

Notwithstanding the intermption in their walk, the ex- 
cellent habit which Mrs. Poyser’s clock had of taking time 
by the forelock had secured their arrival at the village while 
it was still a quarter to two, though almost every one who 
meant to go to church was already within the churchyard 
gates. Those who stayed at home were chiefly mothers, 
like Timothy’s Bess, who stood at her own door nursing her 
baby, and feeling as women feel in that position, — that 
nothing else can be expected of them. 

It was not entirely to see Thias Bede’s funeral that the 
people were standing about the churchyard so long before 
service began; that was their common practice. The 
women, indeed, usually entered the church at once, and the 
farmers’ wives talked in an undertone to each other, over 
the tall pews, about their illnesses and the total failure of 
doctor’s stuff, recommending dandelion-tea and other home- 
made specifics as far preferable ; about the servants, and 

195 


ADAM BEDE 


their growing exorbitance as to wages, whereas the quality 
of their services declined from year to year, and there was 
no girl nowadays to be trusted any further than you could 
see her; about the bad price Mr. Dingall, the Treddleston 
grocer, was giving for butter, and the reasonable doubts 
that might be held as to his solvency, notwithstanding that 
Mrs. Dingall was a sensible woman, and they were all sorry 
for heVy for she had very good kin. Meantime the men lin- 
gered outside; and hardly any of them except the singers, 
who had a humming and fragmentary rehearsal to go 
through, entered the church until Mr. Irwine was in the 
desk. They saw no reason for that premature entrance, — 
what could they do in church if they were there before serv- 
ice began? — and they did not conceive that any power 
in the universe could take it ill of them if they stayed out 
and talked a little about “ business.” 

Chad Cranage looks like quite a new acquaintance to-day, 
for he has got his clean Sunday face, which always makes 
his little granddaughter cry at him as a stranger. But an 
experienced eye would have fixed on him at once as the 
village blacksmith, after seeing the humble deference with 
which the big saucy fellow took off his hat and stroked his 
hair to the farmers; for Chad was accustomed to say that 
a working man must hold a candle to — a personage under- 
stood to be as black as he was himself on week-days; by 
which evil-sounding rule of conduct he meant what was, 
after all, rather virtuous than otherwise, namely, that men 
who had horses to be shod must be treated with respect. 
Chad and the rougher sort of workmen kept aloof from 
the grave under the white thorn, where the burial was going 
forward; but Sandy Jim and several of the farm-labourers 
made a group round it, and stood with their hats off, as 
fellow-mourners with the mother and sons. Others held a 
midway position, sometimes watching the group at the 
grave, sometimes listening to the conversation of the farm- 
ers, who stood in a knot near the church door, and were now 
joined by Martin Poyser, while his family passed into the 
church. On the outside of this knot stood Mr. Casson, the 
landlord of the Donnithorne Arms, in his most striking at- 
titude, — that is to say, with the forefinger of his right hand 

196 


CHURCH 


thrust between the buttons of his waistcoat, his left hand in 
his breeches-pocket, and his head very much on one side; 
looking-, on the whole, like an actor who has only a mono- 
syllabic part intrusted to him, but feels sure that the audi- 
ence discern his fitness for the leading business ; curiously 
in contrast with old Jonathan Burge, who held his hands 
behind him, and leaned forward coughing asthmatically, 
with an inward scorn of all knowingness that could not be 
turned into cash. The talk was in rather a lower tone than 
usual to-day, hushed a little by the sound of Mr. Irwine’s 
voice reading the final prayers of the burial-service. They 
had all had their word of pity for poor Thias, but now they 
had got upon the nearer subject of their own grievances 
against Satchell, the Squire's bailiff, who played the part of 
steward so far as it was not performed by old Mr. Donni- 
thorne himself, for that gentleman had the meanness to re- 
ceive his own rents and make bargains about his own tim- 
ber. This subject of conversation was an additional reason 
for not being loud, since Satchell himself might presently 
be walking up the paved road to the church door. And soon 
they became suddenly silent; for Mr. Irwine’s voice had 
ceased, and the group round the white thorn was dispersing 
itself towards the church. 

They all moved aside, and stood with their hats off, while 
Mr. Irwine passed. Adam and Seth were coming next, with 
their mother between them ; for Joshua Rann officiated as 
head sexton as well as clerk, and was not yet ready to follow 
the Rector into the vestry. But there was a pause before the 
three mourners came on : Lisbeth had turned round to look 
again towards the grave ! Ah ! there was nothing now but 
the brown earth under the white thorn. Yet she cried less to- 
day than she had done any day since her husband’s death : 
along with all her grief there was mixed an unusual sense of 
her own importance in having a burial,” and in Mr. Ir- 
wine’s reading a special service for her husband ; and besides, 
she knew the funeral psalm was going to be sung for him. 
She felt this counter-excitement to her sorrow still more 
strongly as she walked with her sons towards the church 
door, and saw the friendly, sympathetic nods of their fellow- 
parishioners. 


197 


ADAM BEDE 


The mother and sons passed into the church, and one by 
one the loiterers followed, through some still lingered with- 
out; the sight of Mr. Donnithorne’s carriage, which was 
winding slowly up the hill, perhaps helping to make them 
feel that there was no need for haste. 

But presently the sound of the bassoon and the key-bugles 
burst forth; the evening hymn, which always opened the 
service, had begun, and every one must now eitter and take 
his place. 

I cannot say that the interior of Hayslope Church was 
remarkable for anything except for the gray age of its oaken 
pews, — great square pews mostly, ranged on each side of 
a narrow aisle. It was free, indeed, from the modern blem- 
ish of galleries. The choir had two narrow pews to them- 
selves in the middle of the right-hand row, so that it was a 
short process for Joshua Rann to take his place among them 
as principal bass, and return to his desk after the singing was 
over. The pulpit and desk, gray and old as the pews, stood 
on one side of the arch leading into the chancel, which also 
had its gray square pews for Mr. Donnithorne’s family and 
servants. Yet I assure you these gray pews, with the buff- 
washed walls, gave a very pleasing tone to this shabby in- 
terior, and agreed extremely well with the ruddy faces and 
bright waistcoats. And there were liberal touches of crim- 
son toward the chancel, for the pulpit and Mr. Donni- 
thorne’s own pew had handsome crimson cloth cushions; 
and, to close the vista, there was a crimson altar-cloth, em- 
broidered with golden rays by Miss Lydia’s own hand. 

But even without the crimson cloth, the effect must have 
been warm and cheering when Mr. Irwine was in the desk, 
looking benignly round on that simple congregation, — on 
the hardy old men, with bent knees and shoulders, perhaps, 
but with vigour left for much hedge-clipping and thatching ; 
on the tall, stalwart frames and roughly cut bronzed faces 
of the stone-cutters and carpenters ; on the half-dozen well- 
to-do farmers, with their apple-cheeked families ; and on the 
clean old women, mostly farm-labourers’ wives, with their 
bit of snow-white cap-border under their black bonnets, and 
with their withered arms, bare from the elbow, folded pas- 
sively over their chests. For none of the old people held 

198 


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books, — why should they ? not one of them could read. 
But they knew a few good words ” by heart, and their 
withered lips now and then moved silently, following the 
service without any very clear comprehension indeed, but 
with a simple faith in its efficacy to ward off harm and bring 
blessing. And now all faces were visible, for all were stand- 
ing up, — the little children on the seats peeping over the 
edge of the gray pews, while good Bishop Ken’s evening 
hymn was being sung to one of those lively psalm-tunes 
which died out with the last generation of rectors and choral 
parish-clerks. Melodies die out, like the pipe of Pan, with 
the ears that love them and listen for them. Adam was not 
in his usual place among the singers to-day, for he sat with 
his mother and Seth, and he noticed with surprise that 
Bartle Massey was absent too: all the more agreeable for 
Mr. Joshua Rann, who gave out his bass notes with unusual 
complacency, and threw an extra ray of severity into the 
glances he sent over his spectacles at the recusant Will 
Maskery. 

I beseech you to imagine Mr. Irwine looking round on 
this scene, in his ample white surplice, that became him so 
v/ell, with his powdered hair thrown back, his rich brown 
complexion, and his finely cut nostril and upper lip; for 
there was a certain virtue in that benignant yet keen counte- 
nance, as there is in all human faces from which a generous 
soul beams out. And over all streamed the delicious June 
sunshine through the old windows, with their desultory 
patches of yellow, red, and blue, that threw pleasant touches 
of colour on the opposite wall. 

I think, as Mr. Irwine looked round to-day, his eyes rest- 
ed an instant longer than usual on the square pew occupied 
by Martin Poyser and his family; and there was another 
pair of dark eyes that found it impossible not to wander 
thither, and rest on that round pink-and-white figure. But 
Hetty was at that moment quite careless of any glances, — 
she was absorbed in the thought that Arthur Donnithorne 
would soon be coming into church, for the carriage must 
surely be at the church gate by this time. She had never 
seen him since she parted with him in the wood on Thurs- 
day evening, and oh! how long the time had seemed! 

199 


ADAM BEDE 


Things had gone on just the same as ever since that even- 
ing; the wonders that had happened then had brought no 
changes after them ; they were already like a dream. When 
she heard the church door swinging, her heart beat so, she 
dared not look up. She felt that her aunt was courtesying ; 
she courtesied herself. That must be old Mr. Donnithorne, 
— he always came first, the wrinkled, small old man, peer- 
ing round with short-sighted glances at the bowing and 
courtesying congregation ; then she knew Miss Lydia was 
passing, and though Hetty liked so much to look at her 
fashionable little coal-scuttle bonnet, with the wreath of 
small roses round it, she did n’t mind it to-day. But there 
were no more courtesies, — no, he was not come ; she felt 
sure there was nothing else passing the pew door but the 
housekeeper ’s black bonnet and the lady ’s-maid ’s beauti- 
ful straw that had once been Miss Lydia’s, and then the 
powdered heads of the butler and footman. No, he was 
not there ; yet she would not look now, — she might be mis- 
taken, — for, after all, she had not looked. So she lifted up 
her eyelids, and glanced timidly at the cushioned pew in the 
chancel. There was no one but old Mr. Donnithorne rub- 
bing his spectacles with his white handkerchief, and Miss 
Lydia opening the large gilt-edged prayer-book. The chill 
disappointment was too hard to bear; she felt herself turn- 
ing pale, her lips trembling ; she was ready to cry. Oh, what 
should she do ? Everybody would know the reason ; they 
would know she was crying because Arthur was not there. 
And Mr. Craig, with the wonderful hothouse plant in his 
button-hole, was staring at her, she knew. It was dread- 
fully long before the General Confession began, so that she 
could kneel down. Two great drops would fall then ; but no 
one saw them except good-natured Molly, for her aunt and 
uncle knelt with their backs towards her. Molly, unable to 
imagine any cause for tears in church except faintness, of 
which she had a vague traditional knowledge, drew out of 
her pocket a queer little flat blue smelling-bottle, and after 
much labour in pulling the cork out, thrust the narrow neck 
against Hetty’s nostrils. “ It donna smell,” she whispered, 
thinking this was a great advantage which old salts had over 
fresh ones: they did you good without biting your nose. 


200 


CHURCH 


Hetty pushed it away peevishly ; but this little flash of tem- 
per did what the salts could not have done, — it roused her 
to wipe away the traces of her tears, and try with all her 
might not to shed any more. Hetty had a certain strength 
in her vain little nature; she would have borne anything 
rather than be laughed at, or pointed at with any other feel- 
ing than admiration ; she would have pressed her own nails 
into her tender flesh rather than people should know a se- 
cret she did not want them to know. 

What fluctuations there were in her busy thoughts and 
feelings while Mr. Irwine was pronouncing the solemn 
“ Absolution ” in her deaf ears, and through all the tones of 
petition that followed ! Anger lay very close to disappoint- 
ment, and soon won the victory over the conjectures her 
small ingenuity could devise to account for Arthur’s absence 
on the supposition that he really wanted to come, really 
wanted to see her again. And by the time she rose from her 
knees mechanically, because all the rest were rising, the 
colour had returned to her cheeks even with a heightened 
glow, for she was framing little indignant speeches to her- 
self, saying she hated Arthur for giving her this pain, — she 
would like him to suffer too. Yet while this selfish tumult 
was going on in her soul, her eyes were bent down on her 
prayer-book and the eyelids with their dark fringe looked 
as lovely as ever. Adam Bede thought so, as he glanced at 
her for a moment on rising from his knees. 

But Adam’s thoughts of Hetty did not deafen him to the 
service ; they rather blended with all the other deep feelings 
for which the church service was a channel to him this after- 
noon, as a certain consciousness of our entire past and our 
imagined future blends itself with all our moments of keen 
sensibility. And to Adam the church service was the best 
channel he could have found for his mingled regret, yearn- 
ing, and resignation ; its interchange of beseeching cries for 
help, with outbursts of faith and praise, — its recurrent re- 
sponses and the familiar rhythm of its collects seemed to 
speak for him as no other form of worship could have done ; 
as, to those early Christians who had worshipped from their 
childhood upward in catacombs, the torchlight and shadows 
must have seemed nearer the Divine presence than the hea- 


201 


ADAM BEDE 


thenish daylight of the streets. The secret of our emotions 
never lies in the bare object, but in its subtle relations to our 
own past : no wonder the secret escapes the unsympathizing 
observer, who might as well put on his spectacles to discern 
odours. 

But there was one reason why even a chance comer would 
have found the service in Hayslope Church more impres- 
sive than in most other village nooks in the kingdom, — a 
reason, of which I am sure you have not the slightest sus- 
picion. It was the reading of our friend Joshua Rann. 
Where that good shoemaker got his notion of reading from, 
remained a mystery even to his most intimate acquaint- 
ances. I believe, after all, he got it chiefly from Nature, 
who had poured some of her music into this honest, con- 
ceited soul, as she had been known to do into other narrow 
souls before his. She had given him, at least, a fine bass 
voice and a musical ear ; but I cannot positively say whether 
these alone had sufficed to inspire him with the rich chant 
in which he delivered the responses. The way he rolled 
from a rich deep forte into a melancholy cadence, subsiding, 
at the end of the last word, into a sort of faint resonance, 
like the lingering vibrations of a fine violoncello, I can com- 
pare nothing for its strong, calm melancholy but the rush 
and cadence of the wind among the autumn boughs. This 
may seem a strange mode of speaking about the reading of 
a parish-clerk, — a man in rusty spectacles, with stubby 
hair, a large occiput, and a prominent crown. But that is 
Nature’s way : she will allow a gentleman of splendid physi- 
ognomy and poetic aspirations to sing wofully out of tune, 
and not give him the slightest hint of it; and takes care 
that some narrow-browed fellow, trolling a ballad in the 
corner of a pot-house, shall be as true to his intervals as a 
bird. 

Joshua himself was less proud of his reading than of his 
singing, and it was always with a sense of heightened im- 
portance that he passed from the desk to the choir. Still 
more to-day : it was a special occasion ; for an old man, fa- 
miliar to all the parish, had died a sad death, — not in his 
bed, a circumstance the most painful to the mind of the 
peasant, — and now the funeral psalm was to be sung in 


202 


CHURCH 


memory of his sudden departure. Moreover, Bartle Massey 
was not at church, and Joshua's importance in the choir 
suffered no eclipse. It was a solemn minor strain they sang. 
The old psalm tunes have many a wail among them, and the 
words — 

“ Thou sweep’s! us off as with a flood ; 

We vanish hence like dreams ” — 

seemed to have a closer application than usual in the death 
of poor Thias. The mother and sons listened, each with 
peculiar feelings. Lisbeth had a vague belief that the psalm 
was doing her husband good; it was part of that decent 
burial which she would have thought it a greater wrong to 
withhold from him than to have caused him many unhappy 
days while he was living. The more there was said about 
her husband, the more there was done for him, surely the 
safer he would be. It was poor Lisbeth’s blind way of feel- 
ing that human love and pity are a ground of faith in some 
other love. Seth, who was easily touched, shed tears, and 
tried to recall, as he had done continually since his father’s 
death, all that he had heard of the possibility that a single 
moment of consciousness at the last might be a moment of 
pardon and reconcilement ; for was it not written in the very 
psalm they were singing, that the Divine dealings were not 
measured and circumscribed by time? Adam had never 
been unable to join in a psalm before. He had known plen- 
ty of trouble and vexation since he had been a lad ; but this 
was the first sorrow that had hemmed in his voice, and 
strangely enough it was sorrow because the chief source of 
his past trouble and vexation was forever gone out of his 
reach. He had not been able to press his father’s hand be- 
fore their parting, and say, “ Father, you know it was all 
right between us; I never forgot what I owed you when I 
was a lad ; you forgive me if I have been too hot and hasty 
now and then ! ” Adam thought but little to-day of the 
hard work and the earnings he had spent on his father : his 
thoughts ran constantly on what the old man’s feelings had 
been in moments of humiliation, when he had held down 
his head before the rebukes of his son. When our indigna- 
tion is borne in submissive silence, we are apt to feel twinges 
of doubt afterwards as to our own generosity, if not justice; 

203 


ADAM BEDE 


bow much more when the object of our anger has gone into 
everlasting silence, and we have seen his face for the last 
time in the meekness of death ! 

“ Ah ! I was always too hard,” Adam said to himself. 
“ It ’s a sore fault in me as I ’m so hot and out o’ patience 
with people when they do wrong, and my heart gets shut up 
against ’em, so as I can’t bring myself to forgive ’em. I see 
clear enough there’s more pride nor love in my soul, for 
I could sooner make a thousand strokes with th’ hammer 
for my father than bring myself to say a kind word to 
him. And there went plenty o’ pride and temper to the 
strokes, as the devil will be having his finger in what we 
call our duties as well as our sins. Mayhap the best thing I 
ever did in my life was only doing what was easiest for my- 
self. It ’s allays been easier for me to work nor to sit still ; 
but the real tough job for me ’ud be to master my own will 
and temper, and go right against my own pride. It seems to 
me now, if I was to find father at home to-night, I should 
behave different ; but there ’s no knowing, — perhaps noth- 
ing ’ud be a lesson to us if it didn ’t come too late. It ’s well 
we should feel as life ’s a reckoning we can’t make twice 
over ; there ’s no real making amends in this world, any 
more nor you can mend a wrong subtraction by doing your 
addition right.” 

This was the key-note to which Adam’s thoughts had per- 
petually returned since his father’s death, and the solemn 
wail of the funeral psalm was only an influence that brought 
back the old thoughts with stronger emphasis. So was the 
sermon, which Mr. Irwine had chosen with reference to 
Thias’s funeral. It spoke briefly and simply of the words, 
“ In the midst of life we are in death,” — how the present 
moment is all we can call our own for works of mercy, of 
righteous dealing, and of family tenderness : all very old 
truths ; but what we thought the oldest truth becomes the 
most startling to us in the week when we have looked on the 
dead face of one who has made a part of our own lives. For 
when men want to impress us with the effect of a new and 
wonderfully vivid light, do they not let it fall on the most 
familiar objects, that we may measure its intensity by re- 
membering the former dimness? 


204 


CHURCH 


Then came the moment of the final blessing, when the 
forever sublime words, The peace of God, which passeth 
all understanding,’’ seemed to blend with the calm after- 
noon sunshine that fell on the bowed heads of the congrega- 
tion ; and then the quiet rising, the mothers tying on the 
bonnets of the little maidens who had slept through the ser- 
mon, the fathers collecting the prayer-books, until all 
streamed out through the old archway into the green 
churchyard, and began their neighbourly talk, their simple 
civilities, and their invitations to tea ; for on a Sunday every 
one was ready to receive a guest, — it was the day when all 
must be in their best clothes and their best humour. 

Mr. and Mrs. Poyser paused a minute at the church gate : 
they were waiting for Adam to come up, not being con- 
tented to go away without saying a kind word to the widow 
and her sons. 

“Well, Mrs. Bede,” said Mrs. Poyser, as they walked on 
together, “ you must keep up your heart ; husbands and 
wives must be content when they ’ve lived to rear their chil- 
dren and see one another’s hair gray.” 

“ Ay, ay,” said Mr. Poyser ; “ they wonna have long to 
wait for one another then, anyhow. And ye ’ve got two o* 
the strapping’st sons i’ th’ country; and well you may, for 
I remember poor Thias as fine a broad-shouldered fellow as 
need to be ; and as for you, Mrs. Bede, why you ’re straight- 
er i’ the back nor half the young women now.” 

“ Eh,” said Lisbeth, “ it ’s poor luck for the platter to 
wear well when it ’s broke i’ two. The sooner I ’m laid un- 
der the thorn the better. I ’m no good to nobody now.” 

Adam never took notice of his mother’s little unjust 
plaints ; but Seth said : “ Nay, mother, thee mustna say so. 
Thy sons ’ull never get another mother.” 

“ That ’s true, lad, that ’s true,” said Mr. Poyser ; “ and 
it ’s wrong on us to give way to grief, Mrs. Bede ; for it ’s 
like the children cryin ’ when the fathers and mothers take 
things from ’em. There ’s One above knows better nor us.” 

“ Ah,” said Mrs. Poyser, “ an’ it ’s poor work allays settin’ 
the dead above the livin’. We shall all on us be dead some 
time, I reckon, — it ’ud be better if folks ’ud make much on 

205 


ADAM BEDE 


us beforehand, istid o’ beginnin’ when we ’re gone. It ’s 
but little good you ’ll do a-watering the last year’s crop.” 

Well, Adam,” said Mr. Poyser, feeling that his wife’s 
words were, as usual, rather incisive than soothing, and that 
it would be well to change the subject, “ you ’ll come and 
see us again now, I hope. I hanna had a talk with you this 
long while, and the missis here wants you to see what can 
be done with her best spinning-wheel, for it ’s got broke, 
and it ’ll be a nice job to mend it, — there ’ll want a bit o’ 
turning. You’ll come as soon as you can now, will you?” 

Mr. Poyser paused and looked round while he was speak- 
ing, as if to see where Hetty was; for the children were 
running on before. Hetty was not without a companion, 
and she had, besides, more pink and white about her than 
ever ; for she held in her hand the wonderful pink-and-white 
hothouse plant with a very long name, — a Scotch name, 
she supposed, since people said Mr. Craig the gardener was 
Scotch. Adam took the opportunity of looking round too ; 
and I am sure you will not require of him that he should 
feel any vexation in observing a pouting expression on 
Hetty ’s face as she listened to the gardener’s small-talk. 
Yet in her secret heart she was glad to have him by her 
side, for she would perhaps learn from him how it was Ar- 
thur had not come to church. Not that she cared to ask 
him the question, but she hoped the information would be 
given spontaneously; for Mr. Craig, like a superior man, 
was very fond of giving information. 

Mr. Craig was never aware that his conversation and ad- 
vances were received coldly, for to shift one’s point of view 
beyond certain limits is impossible to the most liberal and 
expansive mind ; we are none of us aware of the impression 
we produce on Brazilian monkeys of feeble understanding, 
— it is possible they see hardly anything in us. Moreover, 
Mr. Craig was a man of sober passions, and was already in 
his tenth year of hesitation as to the relative advantages of 
matrimony and bachelorhood. It is true that now and then, 
v/hen he had been a little heated by an extra glass of grog, 
he had been heard to say of Hetty that the lass was well 
enough,” and that “ a man might do worse ;” but on con- 
vivial occasions men are apt to express themselves strongly. 

206 


CHURCH 


Martin Poyser held Mr. Craig in honour, as a man who 
“ knew his business,” and who had great lights concerning 
soils and compost ; but he was less of a favourite with Mrs. 
Poyser, who had more than once said in confidence to her 
husband, “ You Ve mighty fond o ’ Craig; but for my part, I 
think he ’s welly like a cock as thinks the sun ’s rose o’ pur- 
pose to hear him crow.” For the rest, Mr. Craig was an 
estimable gardener, and was not without reasons for having 
a high opinion of himself. He had also high shoulders and 
high cheek-bones, and hung his head forward a little, as he 
walked along with his hands in his breeches-pockets. I 
think it was his pedigree only that had the advantage of 
being Scotch, and not his “ bringing up ;” for except that he 
had a stronger burr in his accent, his speech differed little 
from that of the Loamshire people about him. But a gar- 
dener is Scotch, as a French teacher is Parisian. 

“ Well, Mr. Poyser,” he said, before the good slow farmer 
had time to speak, “ ye ’ll not be carrying your hay to-mor- 
row, I ’m thinking ; the glass sticks at ^ change,’ and ye may 
1 ely upo’ my word as we ’ll ha’ more downfall afore twenty- 
four hours is past. Ye see that darkish-blue cloud there 
upo’ the ’rizon, — ye know what I mean by the ’rizon, 
where the land and sky seems to meet ? ” 

Ay, ay, I see the cloud,” said Mr. Poyser, ’rizon or no 
rizon. It ’s right o’er Mike Holdsworth’s fallow, and a 
foul fallow it is.” 

Well, you mark my words, as that cloud ’ull spread o’er 
the sky pretty nigh as quick as you ’d spread a tarpaulin 
over one o’ your hay-ricks. It ’s a great thing to ha’ studied 
the look o’ the clouds. Lord bless you! th’ met’orological 
almanecks can learn me nothing, but there ’s a pretty sight 
o’ things I could let them up to, if they ’d just come to me. 
And how are you, Mrs. Poyser? — thinking o’ getherin’ the 
red currants soon, I reckon. You ’d a deal better gether ’em 
afore they ’re o’er-ripe, wi’ such weather as we ’ve got to 
look forward to. How do ye do. Mistress Bede?” Mr. 
Craig continued, without a pause, nodding by the way to 
Adam and Seth. “ I hope y’ enjoyed them spinach and 
gooseberries as I sent Chester with th’ other day. If ye 
want vegetables while ye ’re in trouble, ye know where to 

207 


ADAM BEDE 


come to. It ’s well known I ’m not giving other folks’ 
things away ; for when I ’ve supplied the house, the gar- 
den ’s my own spekilation, and it isna every man th’ old 
Squire could get as ’ud be equil to the undertaking, let alone 
asking whether he ’d be willing. I ’ve got to run my cal- 
kilation fine, I can tell you, to make sure o’ getting back 
the money as I pay the Squire. I should like to see some o’ 
them fellows as make the almanecks looking as far before 
their noses as I ’ve got to do every year as comes.” 

“ They look pretty fur, though,” said Mr. Poyser, turning 
his head on one side, and speaking in rather a subdued, rev- 
erential tone. “ Why, what could come truer nor that pic- 
tur o’ the cock wi’ the big spurs, as has got his head 
knocked down wi’ th’ anchor, an’ th’ firin’, an’ the ships 
behind? Why, that pictur was made afore Christmas, and 
yit it ’s come as true as th’ Bible. Why, th’ cock ’s France, 
an’ th’ anchor’s Nelson, — an’ they told us that before- 
hand.” 

“ Pee — ee-eh ! ” said Mr. Craig. “ A man doesna want 
to see fur to know as th’ English ’ull beat the French. Why, 
I know upo’ good authority as it ’s a big Frenchman as 
reaches five foot high, an’ they live upo’ spoon-meat mostly. 
I knew a man as his father had a particular knowledge o’ 
the French. I should like to know what them grasshop- 
pers are to do against such fine fellows as our young Captain 
Arthur. Why, it ’ud astonish a Frenchman only to look at 
him ; his arm ’s thicker nor a Frenchman’s body, I ’ll be 
bound, for they pinch theirsells in wi’ stays ; and it ’s easy 
enough, for they ’ve got nothing i’ their insides.” 

Where is the Captain, as he wasna at church to-day? ” 
said Adam. “ I was talking to him o’ Friday, and he said 
nothing about his going away.” 

“ Oh, he ’s only gone to Eagledale for a bit o’ fishing ; I 
reckon he ’ll be back again afore many days are o’er, for 
he ’s to be at all th’ arranging and preparing o’ things for 
the coniin’ o’ age o’ the 30th o’ July. But he ’s fond o’ get- 
ting away for a bit now and then. Him and th’ old Squire 
fit one another like frost and flowers.” 

Mr. Craig smiled and winked slowly as he made this last 
observation; but the subject was not developed farther, for 

208 


ADAM ON A WORKING DAY 


now they had reached the turning in the road where Adam 
and his companions must say “ good-by.” The gardener, 
too, would have had to turn off in the same direction if he 
had not accepted Mr. Poyser’s invitation to tea. Mrs. Poy- 
ser duly seconded the invitation, for she would have held it 
a deep disgrace not to make her neighbours welcome to her 
house: personal likes and dislikes must not interfere with 
that sacred custom. Moreover, Mr. Craig had always been 
full of civilities to the family at the Hall Farm, and Mrs. 
Poyser was scrupulous in declaring that she had “ nothing 
to say again’ him, on’y it was a pity he couldna be hatched 
o’er again, an’ hatched different.” 

So Adam and Seth, with their mother between them, 
wound their way down to the valley and up again to the old 
house, where a saddened memory had taken the place of a 
long, long anxiety, — where Adam would never have to ask 
again as he entered, “ Where ’s father? ” 

And the other family party, with Mr. Craig for company, 
went back to the pleasant, bright house-place at the Hall 
Farm, — all with quiet minds, except Hetty, who knew now 
where Arthur was gone, but was only the more puzzled and 
uneasy. For it appeared that his absence was quite volun- 
tary ; he need not have gone, — he would not have gone if 
he had wanted to see her. She had a sickening sense that 
no lot could ever be pleasant to her again if her Thursday 
night’s vision was not to be fulfilled ; and in this moment of 
chill, bare, wintry disappointment and doubt, she looked 
towards the possibility of being with Arthur again, of meet- 
ing his loving glance, and hearing his soft words, with that 
eager yearning which one may call the “ growing pain ” of 
passion. 


CHAPTER XIX. 

ADAM ON A WORKING DAY. 

N otwithstanding Mr. Craig’s prophecy, the 

dark-blue cloud dispersed itself without having pro- 
duced the threatened consequences. “ The weather,” as he 
observed the next morning, — “ the weather, you see, ’s a 
1 4 209 


ADAM BEDE 


ticklish thing, an’ a fool ’nil hit on ’t sometimes when a wise 
man misses ; that ’s why the almanecks get so much credit. 
It ’s one o’ them chancy things as fools thrive on.” 

This unreasonable behaviour of the weather, however, 
could displease no one else in Hayslope besides Mr. Craig. 
All hands were to be out in the meadows this morning as 
soon as the dew had risen ; the wives and daughters did 
double work in every farmhouse, that the maids might give 
their help in tossing the hay ; and when Adam was march- 
ing along the lanes, with his basket of tools over his shoul- 
der, he caught the sound of jocose talk and ringing laughter 
from behind the hedges. The jocose talk of hay-makers is 
best at a distance : like those clumsy bells round the cows’ 
necks, it has rather a coarse sound when it comes close, and 
may even grate on your ears painfully; but heard from far 
off, it mingles very prettily with the other joyous sounds of 
Nature. Men’s muscles move better when their souls are 
making merry music, though their merriment is of a poor 
blundering sort, not at all like the merriment of birds. 

And perhaps there is no time in a summer’s day more 
cheering than when the warmth of the sun is just beginning 
to triumph over the freshness of the morning, — when there 
is just a lingering hint of early coolness to keep off languor 
under the delicious influence of warmth. The reason Adam 
was walking along the lanes at this time was because his 
work for the rest of the day lay at a country-house about 
three miles off, which was being put in repair for the son of 
a neighbouring squire ; and he had been busy since early 
morning with the packing of panels, doors, and chimney- 
pieces, in a wagon which was now gone on before him, while 
Jonathan Burge himself had ridden to the spot on horse- 
back, to await its arrival and direct the workmen. 

This little walk was a rest to Adam, and he was uncon- 
sciously under the charm of the moment. It was summer 
morning in his heart, and he saw Hetty in the sunshine, — a 
sunshine without glare, with slanting rays that tremble be- 
tween the delicate shadows of the leaves. He thought yes- 
terday, when he put out his hand to her as they came out of 
church, that there was a touch of melancholy kindness in her 
face, such as he had not seen before, and he took it as a sign 


210 


ADAM ON A WORKING DAY 


that she had some sympathy with his family trouble. Poor 
fellow! that touch of melancholy came from quite another 
source; but how was he to know? We look at the one lit- 
tle woman’s face we love as we look at the face of our 
mother earth, and see all sorts of answers to our own yearn- 
ings. It was impossible for Adam not to feel that what had 
happened in the last week had brought the prospect of 
marriage nearer to him. Hitherto he had felt keenly the 
danger that some other man might step in and get posses- 
sion of Hetty’s heart and hand, while he himself was still in 
a position that made him shrink from asking her to accept 
him. Even if he had had a strong hope that she was fond 
of him, — and his hope was far from being strong, — he had 
been too heavily burthened with other claims to provide a 
home for himself and Hetty, — a home such as he could ex- 
pect her to be content with after the comfort and plenty of 
the Farm. Like all strong natures, Adam had confidence 
in his ability to achieve something in the future ; he felt sure 
he should some day, if he lived, be able to maintain a family, 
and make a good broad path for himself; but he had too 
cool a head not to estimate to the full the obstacles that were 
to be overcome. And the time would be so long! And 
there was Hetty, like a bright-cheeked apple hanging over 
the orchard wall, within sight of everybody, and everybody 
must long for her ! To be sure, if she loved him very much, 
she would be content to wait for him ; but did she love him ? 
His hopes had never risen so high that he had dared to ask 
her. He was clear-sighted enough to be aware that her 
uncle and aunt would have looked kindly on his suit, and in- 
^ieed without this encouragement he would never have per- 
severed in going to the Farm ; but it was impossible to 
come to any but fluctuating conclusions about Hetty’s feel- 
ings. She was like a kitten, and had the same distractingly 
pretty looks, that meant nothing, for everybody that came 
near her. 

But now he could not help saying to himself that the 
heaviest part of his burden was removed, and that even be- 
fore the end of another year his circumstances might be 
brought into a shape that would allow him to think of 
marrying. It would always be a hard struggle with his 

j 


211 


ADAM BEDE 


mother, he knew : she would be jealous of any wife he might 
choose, and she had set her mind especially against Hetty, 

— perhaps for no other reason than that she suspected 
Hetty to be the woman he had chosen. It would never do, 
he feared, for his mother to live in the same house with him 
when he was married ; and yet how hard she would think it 
if he asked her to leave him ! Yes, there was a great deal 
of pain to be gone through with his mother, but it was a 
case in which he must make her feel that his will was strong, 

— it would be better for her in the end. For himself, he 
would have liked that they should all live together till Seth 
was married, and they might have built a bit themselves to 
the old house, and made more room. He did not like “ to 
part wi’ th’ lad ; ” they had hardly ever been separated for 
more than a day since they were born. 

But Adam had no sooner caught his imagination leap- 
ing forward in this way — making arrangements for an un- 
certain future — than he checked himself. “ A pretty 
building I ’m making, without either bricks or timber. I ’m 
up i’ the garret a’ready, and have n’t so much as dug the 
foundation.” Whenever Adam was strongly convinced of 
any proposition, it took the form of a principle in his mind ; 
it was knowledge to be acted on, as much as the knowledge 
that damp will cause rust. Perhaps here lay the secret of 
the hardness he had accused himself of; he had too little 
fellow-feeling with the weakness that errs in spite of fore- 
seen consequences. Without this fellow-feeling, how are we 
to get enough patience and charity towards our stumbling, 
falling companions in the long and changeful journey? And 
there is but one way in which a strong, determined soul can* 
learn it, — by getting his heart-strings bound round the 
weak and erring, so that he must share not only the out- 
ward consequence of their error, but their inward suffer- 
ing. That is a long and hard lesson, and Adam had at pres- 
ent only learned the alphabet of it in his father’s sudden 
death, which, by annihilating in an instant all that had stimu- 
lated his indignation, had sent a sudden rush of thought and 
memory over what had claimed his pity and tenderness. 

But it was Adam’s strength, and its correlative hardness, 
that influenced his meditations this morning. He had long 


212 


ADAM ON A WORKING DAY 


made up his mind that it would be wrong as well as foolish 
for him to marry a blooming young girl, so long as he had 
no other prospect than that of growing poverty with a grow- 
ing family. And his savings had been so constantly drawn 
upon (besides the terrible sweep of paying for Seth’s sub- 
stitute in the militia), that he had not enough money before- 
hand to furnish even a small cottage, and keep something in 
reserve against a rainy day. He had good hope that he 
should be “ firmer on his legs ” by and by ; but he could not 
be satisfied with a vague confidence in his arm and brain; 
he must have definite plans, and set about them at once. 
The partnership with Jonathan Burge was not to be thought 
of at present, — there were things implicitly tacked to it 
that he could not accept ; but Adam thought that he and 
Seth might carry on a little business for themselves in ad- 
dition to their journeyman’s work, by buying a small stock 
of superior wood and making articles of household furniture, 
for which Adam had no end of contrivances. Seth might 
gain more by working at seperate jobs under Adam’s di- 
rection than by his journeyman’s work ; and Adam, in his 
over-hours, could do all the “ nice ” work, that required 
peculiar skill. The money gained in this way, with the good 
wages he received as foreman, would soon enable them to 
get beforehand with the world, so sparingly as they would 
all live now. No sooner had this little plan shaped itself in 
his mind than he began to be busy with exact calculations 
about the wood to be bought, and the particular article of 
furniture that should be undertaken first, — a kitchen cup- 
board of his own contrivance, with such an ingenious ar- 
rangement of sliding-doors and bolts, such convenient nooks 
for stowing household provender, and such a symmetrical 
result to the eye, that every good housewife would be in rap- 
tures with it, and fall through all the gradations of melan- 
choly longing till her husband promised to buy it for her. 
Adam pictured to himself Mrs. Poyser examining it with 
her keen eye, and trying in vain to find out a deficiency; 
and, of course, close to Mrs. Poyser stood Hetty, and Adam 
was again beguiled from calculations and contrivances into 
dreams and hopes. Yes, he would go and see her this even- 
ing, — it was so long since he had been at the Hall Farm. 

213 


ADAM BEDE 


He would have liked to go to the night-school, to see why 
Bartle Massey had not been at church yesterday, for he 
feared his old friend was ill; but unless he could manage 
both visits, this last must be put off till to-morrow, — the 
desire to be near Hetty, and to speak to her again, was too 
strong. 

As he made up his mind to this, he was coming very near 
to the end of his walk, within the sound of the hammers at 
work on the refitting of the old house. The sound of tools 
to a clever workman who loves his work is like the tentative 
sounds of the orchestra to the violinist who has to bear his 
part in the overture; the strong fibres begin their accus- 
tomed thrill, and what was a moment before joy, vexation, 
or ambition, begins its change into energy. All passion be- 
comes strength when it has an outlet from the narrow limits 
of our personal lot in the labour of our right arm, the cun- 
ning of our right hand, or the still, creative activity of our 
thought. Look at Adam through the rest of the day, as he 
stands on the scaffolding with the two-feet ruler in his hand, 
whistling low while he considers how a difficulty about a 
floor-joist or a window-frame is to be overcome; or as he 
pushes one of the younger workmen aside, and takes his 
place in upheaving a weight of timber, saying, “ Let alone, 
lad ! thee \st got too much gristle i’ thy bones yet ; ” or as 
he fixes his keen black eyes on the motions of a workman on 
the Other side of the room, and warns him that his distances 
are not right. Look at this broad-shouldered man with the 
bare muscular arms, and the thick firm black hair tossed 
about like trodden meadow-grass whenever he takes off his 
paper-cap, and with the strong barytone voice bursting 
every now and then into loud and solemn psalm-tunes, as if 
seeking an outlet for superfluous strength, yet presently 
checking himself, apparently crossed by some thought which 
jars with the singing. Perhaps, if you had not been already 
in the secret, you might not have guessed what sad mem- 
ories, what warm affection, what tender fluttering hopes, had 
their home in this athletic body with the broken finger-nails, 
— in this rough man, who knew no better lyrics than he 
could find in the Old and New Version and an occasional 
hymn; who knew the smallest possible amount of profane 

214 


ADAM ON A WORKING DAY 


history ; and for whom the motion and shape of the earth, the 
course of the sun, and the changes of the seasons lay in the 
region of mystery just made visible by fragmentary knowl- 
edge. It had cost Adam a great deal of trouble, and work 
in over-hours, to know what he knew over and above the 
secrets of his handicraft, and that acquaintance with me- 
chanics and figures, and the nature of the materials he 
worked with, which was made easy to him by inborn in- 
herited faculty, — to get the mastery of his pen, and write 
a plain hand, to spell without any other mistakes than must 
in fairness be attributed to the unreasonable character of or- 
thography rather than to any deficiency in the speller, and, 
moreover, to learn his musical notes and part-singing. Be- 
sides all this, he had read his Bible, including the apocry- 
phal books : “ Poor Richard’s Almanac,” Taylor’s “ Holy 
Living and Dying,” “ The Pilgrim’s Progress,” with Bun- 
yan’s Life and “ Holy War,” a great deal of Bailey’s Diction- 
ary, Valentine and Orson,” and part of a “ History of 
Babylon,” which Bartle Massey had lent him. He might 
have had many more books from Bartle Massey, but he had 
no time for reading the “ common print,” as Lisbeth called 
it, so busy as he was with figures in all the leisure moments 
which he did not fill up with extra carpentry. 

Adam, you perceive, was by no means a marvellous man, 
nor, properly speaking, a genius, yet I will not pretend that 
his was an ordinary character among workmen ; and it 
would not be at all a safe conclusion that the next best man 
you may happen to see with a basket of tools over his shoul- 
der and a paper cap on his head has the strong conscience 
and the strong sense, the blended susceptibility and self-com- 
mand, of our friend Adam. He was not an average man. 
Yet such men as he are reared here and there in every gen- 
eration of our peasant artisans, — with an inheritance of 
affections nurtured by a simple family life of common need 
and common industry, and an inheritance of faculties 
trained in skilful, courageous labour ; they make their way 
upward, rarely as geniuses, most commonly as painstaking, 
honest men; with the skill and conscience to do well the 
tasks that lie before them. Their lives have no discernible 
echo beyond the neighbourhood where they dwelt ; but you 

215 


ADAM BEDE 


are almost sure to find there some good piece of road, some 
building, some application of mineral produce, some im- 
provement in farming practice, some reform of parish abuses, 
with which their names are associated by one or two genera- 
tions after them. Their employers were the richer for them, 
the work of their hands has worn well, and the work of their 
brains 'has guided well the hands of other men. They went 
about in their youth in flannel or paper caps, in coats black 
with coal-dust or streaked with lime and red paint; in old 
age their white hairs are seen in a place of honour at church 
and at market, and they tell their well-dressed sons and 
daughters, seated round the bright hearth on winter even- 
ings, how pleased they were when they first earned their 
twopence a-day. Others there are who die poor, and never 
put off the workman’s coat on week-days: they have not 
had the art of getting rich ; but they are men of trust, and 
when they die before the work is all out of them, it is as if 
some main screw had got loose in a machine; the master 
who employed them says, Where shall I find their like? ” 


CHAPTER XX. 


ADAM VISITS THE HALL FARM. 



DAM came back from his work in the empty wagon; 


that was why he had changed his clothes, and was 
ready to set out to the Hall Farm when it still wanted a 
quarter to seven. 

“ What ’s thee got thy Sunday cloose on for ? ” said Lis- 
beth, complainingly, as he came downstairs^ “ Thee artna 
goin’ to th’ school i’ thy best coat ? ” 

“ No, mother,” said Adam, quietly. “ I ’m going to the 
Hall Farm, but mayhap I may go to the school after, so 
thee mustna wonder if I 'm a bit late. Seth ’ull be at home 
in half an hour, — he’s only gone to the village; so thee 
wutna mind.” 

“ Eh, an’ what ’s thee got thy best cloose on for to go 
to th’ Hall Farm? The Poyser folks see’d thee in ’em yes- 


216 


ADAM VISITS THE HALL FARM 


terday, I warrand. What dost mean by turnin’ worki’day 
into Sunday a-that’n ? It ’s poor keepin’ company wi’ folks 
as donna like to see thee i’ thy workin’ jacket.” 

“ Good-by, mother, I can’t stay,” said Adam, putting on 
his hat and going out. 

But he had no sooner gone a few paces beyond the door 
than Lisbeth became uneasy at the thought that she had 
vexed him. Of course, the secret of her objection to the 
best clothes was her suspicion that they were put on for 
Hetty’s sake ; but deeper than all her peevishness lay the 
need that her son should love her. She hurried after him, 
and laid hold of his arm before he had got half-way down to 
the brook, and said, “ Nay, my lad, thee wutna go away 
angered wi’ thy mother, an’ her got nought to do but to sit 
by hersen an’ think on thee? ” 

“ Nay, my mother,” said Adam, gravely, and standing still 
while he put his arm on her shoulder, I ’m not angered. 
But I wish, for thy own sake, thee ’dst be more contented to 
let me do what I ’ve made up my mind to do. I ’ll never be 
no other than a good son to thee as long as we live. But a 
man has other feelings besides what he owes to ’s father and 
mother; and thee oughtna to want to rule over me body 
and soul. And thee must make up thy mind as I ’ll not give 
way to thee where I ’ve a right to do what I like. So let us 
have no more words about it.” 

“ Eh,” said Lisbeth, not willing to show that she felt the 
real bearing of Adam’s words, “ an’ who likes to see thee 
i’ thy best cloose better nor thy mother ? An’ when thee ’st 
got thy face washed as clean as the smooth white pibble, 
an’ thy hair combed so nice, and thy eyes a-sparklin’, — 
what else is there as thy old mother should like to look at 
half so well ? An’ thee sha’t put on thy Sunday cloose when 
thee lik’st for me, — L’ll ne’er plague thee no moor 
about ’n.” 

“ Well, well ; good-by, mother,” said Adam, kissing her, 
and hurrying away. He saw there was no other means of 
putting an end to the dialogue. 

Lisbeth stood still on the spot, shading her eyes and 
looking after him till he was quite out of sight. She felt 
to the full all the meaning that had lain in Adam’s words, 

217- 


ADAM BEDE 


and, as she lost sight of him and turned back slowly into 
the house, she said aloud to herself, — for it was her way to 
speak her thoughts aloud in the long days when her husband 
and sons were at their work, — “ Eh, he ’ll be tellin’ me as 
he ’s goin’ to bring her home one o’ these days ; an’ she ’ll 
be missis o’er me, and I mun look on, belike, while she uses 
the blue-edged platters, and breaks ’em, mayhap, though 
there ’s ne’er been one broke sin’ my old man an’ me bought 
’em at the fair twenty ’ear come next Whissuntide. Eh ! ” 
she went on, still louder, as she caught up her knitting from 
the table, “ but she ’ll ne’er knit the lads’ stockin’s, nor foot 
’em nayther, while I live ; an’ when I ’m gone, he ’ll bethink 
him as nobody ’ull ne’er fit ’s leg an’ foot as his old mother 
did. She ’ll know nothin’ o’ narrowin’ an’ heelin’, I war- 
rand, an’ she ’ll make a long toe as he canna get ’s boot on. 
That ’s what comes o’ marr’in’ young wenches. I war gone 
thirty, an’ th’ feyther too, afore we war married ; an’ young 
enough too. She ’ll be a poor dratchell by then she ’s thirty, 
a-marr’in’ a-that’n, afore her teeth ’s all come.” 

Adam walked so fast that he was at the yard-gate before 
seven. Martin Poyser and the grandfather were not yet 
come in from the meadow : every one was in the meadow, 
even to the black-and-tan terrier, — no one kept watch in the 
yard but the bull-dog ; and when Adam reached the house- 
door, which stood wide open, he saw there was no one in 
the bright, clean house-place. But he guessed where Mrs. 
Poyser and some one else would be, quite within hearing; 
so he knocked on the door and said in his strong voice, 
‘‘ Mrs. Poyser within ? ” 

Come in, Mr. Bede, come in,” Mrs. Poyser called out 
from the dairy. She always gave Adam this title when she 
received him in her own house. “ You may come into the 
dairy if you will, for I canna justly leave the cheese.” 

Adam walked into the dairy, where Mrs. Poyser and 
Nancy were crushng the first evening cheese. 

Why, you might think you war come to a dead-house,” 
said Mrs. Poyser, as he stood in the open doorway. 

They ’re all i’ the meadow ; but Martin ’s sure to be in 
afore long, for they ’re leaving the hay cocked to-night, 
ready for carrying first thing to-morrow. I ’v^ been forced 

218 


ADAM VISITS THE HALL FARM 


t’ have Nancy in, upo’ ^count as Hetty must gether the red 
currants to-night; the fruit allays ripens so contrairy, just 
when every hand ’s wanted. An’ there ’s no trustin’ the 
children to gether it, for they put more into their own 
mouths nor into the basket ; you might as well set the wasps 
to gether the fruit.” 

Adam longed to say he would go into the garden till Mr. 
Poyser came in, but he was not quite courageous enough, 
so he said, “ I could be looking at your spinning-wheel, 
then, and see what wants doing to it. Perhaps it stands in 
the house, where I can find it ? ” 

No, I ’ve put it away in the right-hand parlour ; but 
let it be till I can fetch it and show it you. I ’d be glad now 
if you ’d go into the garden, and tell Hetty to send Totty in. 
The child ’ull run in if she ’s told, an’ I know Hetty ’s let- 
tin’ her eat too many curran’s. I ’ll be much obliged to you, 
Mr. Bede, if you ’ll go and send her in ; an’ there ’s the 
York and Lankester roses beautiful in the garden now, — 
you ’ll like to see ’em. But you ’d like a drink o’ whey first, 
p’r’aps ; I know you ’re fond o’ whey, as most folks is when 
they hanna got to crush it out.” 

“ Thank you, Mrs. Poyser,” said Adam ; “ a drink o’ 
whey ’s allays a treat to me. I ’d rather have it than beer 
any day.” 

“ Ay, ay,” said Mrs. Poyser, reaching a small white basin 
that stood on the shelf, and dipping it into the whey-tub, 
“ the smell o’ bread ’s sweet t’ everybody but the baker. 
The Miss Irwines allays say, ‘ Oh, Mrs. Poyser, I envy you 
your dairy ; and I envy you your chickens ; and what a 
beautiful thing a farmhouse is, to be sure ! ’ An’ I say, ' Yes ; 
a farmhouse is a fine thing for them as look on, an’ don’t 
know the liftin’, an’ the stannin’, and the worritin’ o’ th’ in- 
side, as belongs to ’t.’ ” 

“ Why, Mrs. Poyser, you would n’t like to live anywhere 
else but in a farmhouse, so well as you manage it,” said 
Adam, taking the basin ; “ and there can be nothing to look 
at pleasanter nor a fine milch cow, standing up to ’ts knees 
in pasture, and the new milk frothing in the pail, and the 
fresh butter ready for market, and the calves, and the poul- 

219 


ADAM BEDE 


try. Here ‘s to your health, and may you allays have 
strength to look after your own dairy, and set a pattern t’ all 
the farmers’ wives in the country.” 

Mrs. Poyser was not to be caught in the weakness of 
smiling at a compliment ; but a quiet complacency over- 
spread her face like a stealing sunbeam, and gave a milder 
glance than usual to her blue-gray eyes, as she looked at 
Adam drinking the whey. Ah! I think I taste that whey 
now, — with a flavour so delicate that one can hardly dis- 
tinguish it from an odour, and with that soft gliding 
warmth that fills one’s imagination with a still, happy 
dreaminess. And the light music of the dropping whey is in 
my ears, mingling with the twittering of a bird outside the 
wire network window, — the window overlooking the gar- 
den, and shaded by tall Gueldres roses. 

“Have a little more, Mr. Bede?” said Mrs. Poyser, as 
Adam set down the basin. 

“ No, thank you ; I ’ll go into the garden now, and send 
in the little lass.” 

“ Ay, do ; and tell her to come to her mother in the dairy.” 

Adam walked round by the rick-yard, at present empty of 
ricks, to the little wooden gate leading into the garden, — 
once the well-tended kitchen-garden of a manor-house ; now, 
but for the handsome brick wall with stone coping that ran 
along one side of it, a true farmhouse garden, with hardy 
perennial flowers, unpruned fruit-trees, and kitchen vegeta- 
bles growing together in careless, half-neglected abun- 
dance. In that leafy, flowery, bushy time, to look for any 
one in this garden was like playing at “ hide-and-seek.” 
There were the tall hollyhocks beginning to flower, and 
dazzle the eye with their pink, white, and yellow ; there 
were the syringas and Gueldres roses, all large and disorder- 
ly for want of trimming; there were leafy walls of scarlet 
beans and late peas ; there was a row of bushy filberts in one 
direction, and in another a huge apple-tree making a barren 
circle under its low-spreading boughs. But what signified 
a barren patch or two? The garden was so large. There 
was always a superfluity of broad beans, — it took nine or 
ten of Adam’s strides to get to the end of the uncut grass 
walk that ran by the side of them ; and as for other vegeta- 


220 


ADAM VISITS THE HALL FARM 


bles, there was so much more room than was necessary for 
them, that in the rotation of crops a large flourishing bed of 
groundsel was of yearly occurrence on one spot or other. 
The very rose-trees, at which Adam stopped to pluck one, 
looked as if they grew wild ; they were all huddled together 
in bushy masses, now flaunting with wide-open petals, al- 
most all of them of the streaked pink-and-white kind, which 
doubtless dated from the union of the houses of York and 
Lancaster. Adam was wise enough to choose a compact 
Provence rose that peeped out half smothered by its flaunt- 
ing scentless neighbours, and held it in his hand — he 
thought he should be more at ease holding something in 
his hand — as he walked on to the far end of the garden, 
where he remembered there was the largest row of currant- 
trees, not far off from the great yew-tree arbour. 

But he had not gone many steps beyond the roses, when 
he heard the shaking of a bough, and a boy’s voice saying — 

“ Now, then, Totty, hold out your pinny, — there ’s a 
duck.” 

The voice came from the boughs of a tall cherry-tree,' 
where Adam had no difficulty in discerning a small blue- 
pinafored figure perched in a commodious position where 
the fruit was thickest. Doubtless Totty was below, behind 
the screen of peas. Yes — with her bonnet hanging down 
her back, and her fat face, dreadfully smeared with red juice, 
turned up towards the cherry-tree, while she held her little 
round hole of a mouth and her red-stained pinafore to re- 
ceive the promised downfall. I am sorry to say, more than 
half the cherries that fell were hard and yellow instead of 
juicy and red ; but Totty spent no time in useless regrets, 
and she was already sucking the third juiciest when Adam 
said : “ There now, Totty, you ’ve got your cherries. Run 

into the house with ’em to mother, — she wants you, — 
she ’s in the dairy. Run in this minute, — there ’s a good 
little girl.” 

He lifted her up in his strong arms and kissed her as he 
spoke, — a ceremony which Totty regarded as a tiresome 
interruption to cherry-eating; and when he set her down 
she trotted off quite silently towards the house, sucking her 
cherries as she went along. 


221 


ADAM BEDE 


“ Tommy, my lad, take care you ’re not shot for a little 
thieving bird,” said Adam, as he walked on towards the 
currant-trees. 

He could see there was a large basket at the end of the 
row : Hetty would not be far off, and Adam already felt as 
if she were looking at him. Yet when he turned the corner 
she was standing with her back towards him, and stooping 
to gather the low-hanging fruit. Strange that she had not 
heard him coming ! perhaps it was because she was making 
the leaves rustle. She started when she became conscious 
that some one was near, — started so violently that she 
dropped the basin with the currants in it, and then, when 
she saw it was Adam, she turned from pale to deep red. 
That blush made his heart beat with a new happiness. Hetty 
had never blushed at seeing him before. 

“ I frightened you,” he said, with a delicious sense that it 
did n’t signify what he said, since Hetty seemed to feel as 
much as he did ; let me pick the currants up.” 

That was soon done, for they had only fallen in a tangled 
mass on the grass-plot ; and Adam, as he rose and gave her 
the basin again, looked straight into her eyes with the sub- 
dued tenderness that belongs to the first moments of hope- 
ful love. 

Hetty did not turn away her eyes; her blush had sub- 
sided, and she met his glance with a quiet sadness, which 
contented Adam, because it was so unlike anything he had 
seen in her before. 

“ There ’s not many more currants to get,” she said ; “ I 
shall soon ha’ done now.” 

“ I ’ll help you,” said Adam ; and he fetched the large 
basket, which was nearly full of currants, and set it close 
to them. 

Not a word more was spoken as they gathered the cur- 
rants. Adam’s heart was too full to speak, and he thought 
Hetty knew all that was in it. She was not indifferent to 
his presence, after all; she had blushed when she saw him, 
and then there was that touch of sadness about her which 
must surely mean love, since it was the opposite of her usual 
manner, which had often impressed him as indifference. 
And he could glance at her continually as she bent over 


222 


ADAM VISITS THE HALL FARM 


the fruit, while the level evening sunbeams stole through 
the thick apple-tree boughs, and rested on her round cheek 
and neck as if they too were in love with her. It was to 
Adam the time that a man can least forget in after-life, — 
the time when he believes that the first woman he has ever 
loved betrays by a slight something — a word, a tone, a 
glance, the quivering of a lip or an eyelid — that she is at 
least beginning to love him in return. The sign is so slight, 
it is scarcely perceptible to the ear or eye, — he could de- 
scribe it to no one, — it is a mere feather-touch, yet it seems 
to have changed his whole being, to have merged an uneasy 
yearning into a delicious unconsciousness of everything but 
the present moment. So much of our early gladness van- 
ishes utterly from our memory : we can never recall the joy 
with which we laid our heads on our mother’s bosom or rode 
on our father’s back in childhood ; doubtless that joy is 
wrought up into our nature, as the sunlight of long-past 
mornings is wrought up in the soft mellowness of the apri- 
cot; but it is gone forever from our imagination, and we 
can only believe in the joy of childhood. But the first glad 
moment in our first love is a vision which returns to us to 
the last, and brings with it a thrill of feeling intense and spe- 
cial as the recurrent sensation of a sweet odour breathed in 
a far-off hour of happiness. It is a memory that gives a 
more exquisite touch to tenderness, that feeds the madness 
of jealousy, and adds the last keenness to the agony of de- 
spair. 

Hetty bending over the red bunches, the level rays pier- 
cing the screen of apple-tree boughs, the length of bushy gar- 
den beyond, his own emotion as he looked at her and be- 
lieved that she was thinking of him, and that there was no 
need for them to talk, — Adam remembered it all to the last 
moment of his life. 

And Hetty? You know quite well that Adam was mis- 
taken about her. Like many other men, he thought the 
signs of love for another were signs of love towards him- 
self. When Adam was approaching unseen by her, she was 
absorbed as usual in thinking and wondering about Ar- 
thur’s possible return : the sound of any man’s footstep 
would have affected her just in the same way, — she would 


223 


ADAM BEDE 


have felt it might be Arthur before she had time to see, and 
the blood that forsook her cheek in the agitation of that 
momentary feeling would have rushed back again at the 
sight of any one else just as much as at the sight of Adam. 
He was not wrong in thinking that a change had come over 
Hetty : the anxieties and fears of a first passion, with which 
she was trembling, had become stronger than vanity, had 
given her for the first time that sense of helpless dependence 
on another’s feeling which awakens the clinging, deprecat- 
ing womanhood even in the shallowest girl that can ever 
experience it, and creates in her a sensibility to kindness 
which found her quite hard before. For the first time Hetty 
felt that there was something soothing to her in Adam’s 
timid yet manly tenderness : she wanted to be treated lov- 
ingly, — oh, it was very hard to bear this blank of absence, 
silence, apparent indifference, after those moments of glow- 
ing love! She was not afraid that Adam would tease her 
with love-making and flattering speeches like her other ad- 
mirers : he had always been so reserved to her ; she could 
enjoy without any fear the sense that this strong, brave man 
loved her, and was near her. It never entered into her mind 
that Adam was pitiable too, — that Adam, too, must suffer 
one day. 

Hetty, we know, was not the first woman that had be- 
haved more gently to the man who loved her in vain, be- 
cause she had herself begun to love another. It was a very 
old story; but Adam knew nothing about it, so he drank 
in the sweet delusion. 

“ That ’ll do,” said Hetty, after a little while. Aunt 
wants me to leave some on the trees. I ’ll take ’em in now.” 

“ It ’s very well I came to carry the basket,” said Adam, 
“ for it ’ud ha’ been too heavy for your little arms.” 

“ No ; I could ha’ carried it with both hands.” 

“ Oh, I dare say,” said Adam, smiling, “ and been as 
long getting into the house as a little ant carrying a cater- 
pillar. Have you ever seen those tiny fellows carrying 
things four times as big as themselves ? ” 

“ No,” said Hetty, indifferently, not caring to know the 
difficulties of ant-life. 

“ Oh, I used to watch ’em often when I was a lad. But 


224 


ADAM VISITS THE HALL FARM 


now, you see, I can carry the basket with one arm, as if it 
was an empty nutshell, and give you th’ other arui to lean 
on. Won’t you? Such big arms as mine were made for 
little arms like yours to lean on.” 

Hetty smiled faintly, and put her arm within his. Adam 
looked down at her, but her eyes were turned dreamily 
towards another corner of the garden. 

‘‘ Have you ever been to Eagledale ? ” she said, as they 
walked slowly along. 

“ Yes,” said Adam, pleased to have her ask a question 
about himself ; ten years ago, when I was a lad, I went 
with father to see about some work there. It ’s a wonder- 
ful sight, — rocks and caves such as you never saw in your 
life. I never had a right notion o’ rocks till I went there.” 

“ How long did it take to get there ? ” 

“ Why, it took us the best part o’ two days’ walking. 
But it ’s nothing of a day’s journey for anybody as has got 
a first-rate nag. The Captain ’ud get there in nine or ten 
hours. I ’ll be bound, he ’s such a rider. And I should n’t 
wonder if he ’s back again to-morrow ; he ’s too active to 
rest long in that lonely place, all by himself, for there ’s noth- 
ing but a bit of a inn i’ that part where he ’s gone to fish. 
I wish he ’d got th’ estate in his hands ; that ’ud be the right 
thing for him, for it ’ud give him plenty to do, and he ’d do 
’t well too, for all he ’s so young ; he ’s got better notions o’ 
things than many a man twice his age. He spoke very 
handsome to me th’ other day about lending me money to 
set up i’ business ; and if things came round that way, I ’d 
rather be beholding to him nor to any man i’ the world.” 

Poor Adam was led on to speak about Arthur because 
he thought Hetty would be pleased to know that the young 
squire was so ready to befriend him ; the fact entered into 
his future prospects, which he would like to seem promising 
in her eyes. And it was true that Hetty listened with an 
interest which brought a new light into her eyes and a half 
smile upon her lips. 

“ How pretty the roses are now ! ” Adam continued, paus- 
ing to look at them. “ See ! I stole the prettiest, but I 
didna mean to keep it myself. I think these as are all pink, 

1 5 225 


ADAM BEDE 


and have got a finer sort o’ green leaves, are prettier than 
the striped uns, don’t you ? ” 

He set down the basket, and took the rose from his but- 
ton-hole. 

“ It smells very sweet,” he said ; “ those striped uns have 
no smell. Stick it in your frock, and then you can put it in 
water after. It ’ud be a pity to let it fade.” 

Hetty took the rose, smiling as she did so at the pleasant 
thought that Arthur could so soon get back if he liked. 
There was a flash of hope and happiness in her mind, and 
with a sudden impulse of gayety she did what she had very 
often done before, — stuck the rose in her hair a little above 
the left ear. The tender admiration in Adam’s face was 
slightly shadowed by reluctant disapproval. Hetty’s love 
of finery was just the thing that would most provoke his 
mother, and he himself disliked it as much as it was possible 
for him to dislike anything that belonged to her. 

“ Ah,” he said, “ that ’s like the ladies in the pictures at 
the Chase ; they ’ve mostly got flowers or feathers or gold 
things i’ their hair, but somehow I don’t like to see ’em ; 
they allays put me i’ mind o’ the painted women outside the 
shows at Treddles’on fair. What can a woman have to set 
her off better than her own hair, when it curls so, like yours ? 
If a woman ’s young and pretty, I think you can see her 
good looks all the better for her being plain dressed. Why, 
Dinah Morris looks very nice, for all she wears such a plain 
cap and gown. It seems to me as a woman’s face doesna 
want flowers ; it ’s almost like a flower itself. I ’m sure 
yours is.” 

“ Oh, very well,” said Hetty, with a little playful pout, 
taking the rose out of her hair. “ I ’ll put one o’ Dinah’s 
caps on when we go in, and you ’ll see if I look better in it. 
She left one behind, so I can take the pattern.” 

“ Nay, nay, I don’t want you to wear a Methodist cap 
like Dinah’s. I dare say it ’s a very ugly cap, and I used 
to think, when I saw her here, as it was nonsense for her 
to dress different t’ other people; but I never rightly no- 
ticed her till she came to see mother last week, and then I 
thought the cap seemed to fit her face somehow as th’ acorn- 
cup fits th’ acorn, and I should n’t like to see her so well 

226 


ADAM VISITS THE HALL FARM 


without it. But you ’ve got another sort o’ face ; I ’d have 
you just as you are now, without anything t’ interfere with 
your own looks. It ’s like when a man ’s singing a good 
tune, you don’t want t’ hear bells tinkling and interfering 
wi’ the sound.” 

He took her arm and put it within his again, looking 
down on her fondly. He was afraid she should think he had 
lectured her; imagining, as we are apt to do, that she had 
perceived all the thoughts he had only half expressed. And 
the thing he dreaded most was lest any cloud should come 
over this evening’s happiness. For the world he would not 
have spoken of his love to Hetty yet, till this commencing 
kindness towards him should have grown into unmistakable 
love. In his imagination he saw long years of his future 
life stretching before him, blest with the right to call Hetty 
his own; he could be content with very little at present. 
So he took up the basket of currants once more, and they 
went on towards the house. 

The scene had quite changed in the half-hour that Adam 
had been in the garden. The yard was full of life now: 
Marty was letting the screaming geese through the gate, and 
wickedly provoking the gander by hissing at him ; the gran- 
ary-door was groaning on its hinges as Alick shut it, after 
dealing out the corn; the horses were being led out to 
watering, amidst much barking of all the three dogs, and 
many “ whups ” from Tim the ploughman, as if the heavy 
animals who held down their meek, intelligent heads, and 
lifted their shaggy feet so deliberately, were likely to rush 
wildly in every direction but the right. Everybody was 
come back from the meadow ; and when Hetty and Adam 
entered the house-place, Mr. Peyser was seated in the three- 
cornered chair, and the grandfather in the large arm-chair 
opposite, looking on with pleasant expectation while the 
supper was being laid on the oak table. Mrs. Poyser had 
laid the cloth herself, — a cloth made of homespun linen, 
with a shining checkered pattern on it, and of an agreeable 
whitey-brown hue, such as all sensible housewives like to 
see, — none of your bleached “ shop-rag ” that would wear 
into holes in no time, but good homespun that would last 
for two generations. The cold veal, the fresh lettuces, and 

227 


ADAM BEDE 


the stuffed chine might well look tempting to hungry men 
who had dined at half-past twelve o’clock. On the large 
deal table against the wall there were bright pewter plates 
and spoons and cans, ready for Alick and his companions : 
for the master and servants ate their supper not far off each 
other; which was all the pleasanter, because if a remark 
about to-morrow morning’s work occurred to Mr. Poyser, 
Alick was at hand to hear it. 

Well, Adam, I ’m glad to see ye,” said Mr. Poyser. 
“ What ! ye ’ve been helping Hetty to gether the curran’s, 
eh? Come, sit ye down, sit ye down. Why, it’s pretty 
near a three-week since y’ had your supper with us ; and 
the missis has got one of her rare stuffed chines. I ’m glad 
ye ’re come.” 

“ Hetty,” said Mrs. Poyser, as she looked into the basket 
of currants to see if the fruit was fine, “ run upstairs, and 
send Molly down. She ’s putting Totty to bed, and I want 
her to draw th’ ale, for Nancy ’s busy yet i’ the dairy. You 
can see to the child. But whativer did you let her run away 
from you along wi’ Tommy for, and stuff herself wi’ fruit 
as she can’t eat a bit o’ good victual ? ” 

This was said in a lov/er tone than usual, while her hus- 
band was talking to Adam ; for Mrs. Poyser was strict in 
adherence to her own rules of propriety, and she considered 
that a young girl was not to be treated sharply in the pres- 
ence of a respectable man who was courting her. That 
would not be fair-play : every woman was young in her turn, 
and had her chances of matrimony, which it was a point of 
honour for other women not to spoil, — just as one market- 
woman who has sold her own eggs must not try to balk 
another of a customer. 

Hetty made haste to run away upstairs, not easily find- 
ing an answer to her aunt’s question ; and Mrs. Poyser went 
out to see after Marty and Tommy, and bring them in to 
supper. 

Soon they were all seated, — the two rosy lads, one on 
each side, by the pale mother, a place being left for Hetty 
between Adam and her uncle. Alick too was come in, and 
was seated in his far corner, eating cold broad beans out 
of a large dish with his pocket-knife, and finding a flavour 

228 


ADAM VISITS THE HALL FARM 


in them which he would not have exchanged for the finest 
pineapple. 

“ What a time that gell is drawing th’ ale, to be sure ! 
said Mrs. Poyser, when she was dispensing her slices of 
stuffed chine. “ I think she sets the jug under and forgets 
to turn the tap, as there ’s nothing you can’t believe o’ them 
wenches : they ’ll set the empty kettle o’ the fire, and then 
come an hour after to see if the water boils.” 

“ She ’s drawin’ for the men too,” said Mr. Poyser. Thee 
shouldst ha’ told her to bring our jug up first.” 

“Told her?” said Mrs. Poyser; “yes, I might spend all 
the wind i’ my body, an’ take the bellows too, if I was to 
tell them gells everything as their own sharpness wonna tell 
’em. Mr. Bede, will you take some vinegar with your let- 
tuce? Ay, you’re i’ the right not. It spoils the flavour o’ 
the chine, to my thinking. It ’s poor eating where the 
flavour o’ the meat lies i’ the cruets. There ’s folks as make 
bad' butter, and trusten to the salt t’ hide it.” 

Mrs. Poyser’s attention was here diverted by the appear- 
ance of Molly, carrying a large jug, two small mugs, and 
four drinking-cans, all full of ale or small beer, — an in- 
teresting example of the prehensile power possessed by the 
human hand. Poor Molly’s mouth was rather wider open 
than usual, as she walked along with her eyes fixed on the 
double cluster of vessels in her hands, quite innocent of the 
expression in her mistress’s eye. 

“ Molly, I niver knew your equils, — to think o’ your poor 
mother as is a widow, an’ I took you wi’ as good as no 
character, an’ the times an’ times I ’ve told you — ” 

Molly had not seen the lightning, and the thunder shook 
her nerves the more for the want of that preparation. With 
a vague,' alarmed sense that she must somehow comport 
herself differently, she hastened her step a little towards the 
far deal table, where she might set down her cans, — caught 
her foot in her apron, which had become untied, and fell 
with a crash and a splash into a pool of beer; whereupon 
a tittering explosion from Marty and Tommy, and a serious 
“ Elio ! ” from Mr. Poyser, who saw his draught of ale un- 
pleasantly deferred. 

“ There you go ! ” resumed Mrs Poyser, in a cutting tone, 
229 


ADAM BEDE 


as she rose and went towards the cupboard, while Molly be- 
gan dolefully to pick up the fragments of pottery. It 's 
what I told you ’ud come, over and over again ; and there ’s 
your month’s wage gone, and more, to pay for that jug as 
I ’ve had i’ the house this ten year, and nothing ever hap- 
pened to ’t before : but the crockery you ’ve broke sin’ here 
in th’ house you ’ve been ’ud make a parson swear, — God 
forgi’ me for saying so ; an’ if it had been boiling wort out 
o’ the copper, it ’ud ha’ been the same, and you ’d ha’ been 
scalded, and very like lamed for life, as there ’s no knowing 
but what you will be some day if you go on; for anybody 
’ud think you ’d got the St. Vitus’s Dance, to see the things 
you ’ve throwed down. It ’s a pity but what the bits was 
stacked up for you to see, though it ’s neither seeing nor 
hearing as ’ull make much odds to you, — anybody ’ud 
think you war case-hardened.” 

Poor Molly’s tears were dropping fast by this time, and 
in her desperation at the lively movement of the beer-stream 
towards Alick’s legs, she was converting her apron into a 
mop, while Mrs. Poyser, opening the cupboard, turned a 
blighting eye upon her. 

“ Ah,” she went on, “ you ’ll do no good wi’ crying an’ 
making more wet to wipe up. It ’s all your own wilfulness, 
as I tell you, for there ’s nobody no call to break anything 
if they ’ll only go the right way to work. But wooden folks 
had need ha’ wooden things t’ handle. And here must I 
take the brown-and-white jug, as it ’s niver been used three 
times this year, and go down i’ the cellar myself, and be- 
like catch my death, and be laid up wi’ inflammation — ” 

Mrs. Poyser had turned round from the cupboard with the 
brown-and-white jug in her hand, when she caught sight of 
something at the other end of the kitchen ; perhaps it was 
because she was already trembling and nervous that the 
apparition had so strong an effect on her; perhaps Jug- 
breaking, like other crimes, has a contagious influence. 
However it was, she stared and started like a ghost-seer, 
and the precious brown-and-white jug fell to the ground, 
parting forever with its spout and handle. 

'' Did ever anybody see the like ! ” she said, with a sud- 
denly lowered tone, after a moment’s bewildered glance 

230 


ADAM VISITS THE HALL FARM 


round the room. “ The jugs are bewitched, I think. It ’s 
them nasty glazed handles, — they slip o’er the finger like 
a snail.*’ 

“ Why, thee ’st let thy own whip fly i’ thy face,” said her 
husband, who had now joined in the laugh of the young 
ones. 

It ’s all very fine to look on and grin,” rejoined Mrs. 
Poyser ; “ but there ’s times when the crockery seems alive, 
an’ flies out o’ your hand like a bird. It ’s like the glass, 
sometimes, ’ull crack as it stands. What is to be broke 
ivill be broke, for I never dropped a thing i’ my life for want 
o’ holding it, else I should never ha’ kept the crockery all 
these ’ears as I bought at my own wedding. And, Hetty, 
are you mad? Whativer do you mean by coming down i’ 
that way, and making one think as there ’s a ghost a-walk- 
ing i’ th* house ? ” 

A new outbreak of laughter, while Mrs. Poyser was speak- 
ing, was caused, less by her sudden conversion to a fatalistic 
view of jug-breaking than by that strange appearance of 
Hetty, which had startled her aunt. The little minx had 
found a black gown of her aunt’s, and pinned it close round 
her neck to look like Dinah’s, had made her hair as flat as 
she could, and had tied on one of Dinah’s high-crowned 
borderless net caps. The thought of Dinah’s pale grave 
face and mild gray eyes, which the sight of the gown and 
cap brought with it, made it a laughable surprise enough 
to see them replaced by Hetty’s round rosy cheeks and 
coquettish dark eyes. The boys got off their chairs and 
jumped round her, clapping their hands, and even Alick 
gave a low ventral laugh as he looked up from his beans. 
Under cover of the noise, Mrs. Poyser went into the back- 
kitchen to send Nancy into the cellar with the great pewter 
measure, which had some chance of being free from be- 
witchment. 

“ Why, Hetty, lass, are ye turned Methodist ? ” said Mr. 
Poyser, with that comfortable, slow enjoyment of a laugh 
which one only sees in stout people. “ You must pull your 
face a deal longer before you ’ll do for one ; mustna she, 
Adam ? How come you to put them things on, eh ? ” 

“ Adam said he liked Dinah’s cap and gown better nor 

231 


ADAM BEDE 


my clothes/’ said Hetty, sitting down demurely. “ He says 
folks look better in ugly clothes.” 

“Nay, nay,” said Adam, looking at her admiringly; “I 
only said they seemed to suit Dinah. But if I ’d said you ’d 
look pretty in ’em, I should ha’ said nothing but what was 
true.” 

“ Why, thee thought ’st Hetty war a ghost, didstna ? ” 
.said Mr. Poyser to his wife, who now came back and took 
her seat again. “ Thee look’dst as scared as scared.” 

“ It little sinnifies how I looked,” said Mrs. Poyser ; 
“ looks ’ull mend no jugs, nor laughing neither, as I see. 
Mr. Bede, I ’m sorry you ’ve to wait so long for your ale, but 
it ’s coming in a minute. Make yourself at home wi’ th’ cold 
potatoes; I know you like ’em. Tommy, I ’ll send you to 
bed this minute if you don’t give over laughing. What is 
there to laugh at, I should like to know ? I ’d sooner cry 
nor laugh at the sight o’ that poor thing’s cap ; and there ’s 
them as ’ud be better if they could make theirselves like 
her i’ more ways nor putting on her cap. It little becomes 
anybody i’ this house to make fun o’ my sister’s child, an’ 
her just gone away from us, as it went to my heart to part 
wi’ her: an’ I know one thing, as if trouble was to come, 
an’ I was to be laid up i’ my bed, an’ the children was to 
die, — as there ’s no knowing but what they will, — an’ the 
murrain was to come among the cattle again, an’ every- 
thing went to rack an’ ruin, — I say we might be glad to 
get sight o’ Dinah’s cap again, wi’ her own face under it. 
border or no border. For she ’s one o’ them things as looks 
the brightest on a rainy day, and loves you the best when 
you ’re most i’ need on ’t.” 

Mrs. Poyser, you perceive, was aware that nothing would 
be so likely to expel the comic as the terrible. Tommy, who 
was of a susceptible disposition and very fond of his mother, 
and who had, besides, eaten so many cherries as to have 
his feelings less under command than usual, was so affected 
by the dreadful picture she had made of the possible future, 
that he began to cry; and the good-natured father, indul- 
gent to all weaknesses but those of negligent farmers, said 
to Hetty, — 


232 


ADAM VISITS THE HALL FARM 


“ You ’d better take the things of¥ again, my lass ; it hurts 
your aunt to see ’em.” 

Hetty went upstairs again, and the arrival of the ale made 
an agreeable diversion; for Adam had to give his opinion 
of the new tap, which could not be otherwise than com- 
plimentary to Mrs. Poyser; and then followed a discussion 
on the secrets of good brewing, the folly of stinginess in 
“ hopping,” and the doubtful economy of a farmer’s making 
his own malt. Mrs. Poyser had so many opportunities of 
expressing herself with weight on these subjects, that by the 
time supper was ended, the ale-jug refilled, and Mr. Poyser’s 
pipe alight^ she was once more in high good-humour, and 
ready, at Adam’s request, to fetch the broken spinning- 
wheel for his inspection. 

“ Ah,” said Adam, looking at it carefully, here ’s a nice 
bit o’ turning wanted. It ’s a pretty wheel. I must have 
it up at the turning-shop in the village, and do it there, for 
I ’ve no conven’ence for turning at home. If you ’ll send it 
to Mr. Burge’s shop i’ the morning, I ’ll get it done for you 
by Wednesday. I ’ve been turning it over in my mind,” he 
continued, looking at Mr. Poyser, ‘‘ to make a bit more 
conven’ence at home for nice jobs o’ cabinet-making. I ’ve 
always done a deal at such little things in odd hours, and 
they ’re profitable, for there ’s more workmanship nor ma- 
terial in ’em. I look for me and Seth to get a little business 
for ourselves i’ that way ; for I know a man at Rosseter as 
’ull take as many things as we should make, besides what 
we could get orders for round about.” 

Mr. Poyser entered with interest into a project which 
seemed to step towards Adam’s becoming a master-man ; ” 
and Mrs. Poyser gave her approbation to the scheme of the 
movable kitchen cupboard, which was to be capable of con- 
taining grocery, pickles, crockery, and house-linen, in the 
utmost compactness, without confusion. Hetty, once more 
in her own dress, with her neckerchief pushed a little back- 
wards on this warm evening, was seated picking currants 
near the window, where Adam could see her quite well. And 
so the time passed pleasantly till Adam got up to go. He 
was pressed to come again soon, but not to stay longer, for 


233 


ADAM BEDE 


at this busy time sensible people would not run the risk of 
being sleepy at five o’clock in the morning. 

“ I shall take a step farther,” said Adam, and go on to 
see Mester Massey, for he was n’t at church yesterday, and 
I ’ve not seen him for a week past. I ’ve never hardly known 
him to miss church before.” 

Ay,” said Mr. Poyser, we Ve heard nothing about him, 
for it ’s the boys’ hollodays now, so we can give you no 
account.” 

“ But you ’ll niver think o’ going there at this hour o’ 
the night ? ” said Mrs. Poyser, folding up her knitting. 

“ Oh, Mester Massey sits up late,” said Adam. '' An’ the 
night-school ’s not over yet. Some o’ the men don’t come 
till late, — they ’ve got so far to walk. And Bartle him- 
self ’s never in bed till it ’s gone eleven.” 

I wouldna have him to live wi’ me, then,” said Mrs. 
Poyser, “ a-dropping candle-grease about, as you ’re like to 
tumble down o’ the floor the first thing i’ the morning.” 

“ Ay, eleven o’clock ’s late, — it ’s late,” said old Martin. 

I ne’er sot up so i’ my life, not to say as it warna a mar- 
r’in’, or a christenin’, or a wake, or th’ harvest supper. 
Eleven o’clock ’s late.” 

“ Why, I sit up till after twelve often,” said Adam, laugh- 
ing ; “ but it is n’t t’ eat and drink extry, it ’s to work extry. 
Good-night, Mrs. Poyser ; good-night, Hetty.” 

Hetty could only smile and not shake hands, tor hers were 
dyed and damp with currant-juice; but all the rest gave a 
hearty shake to the large palm that was held out to them, 
and said, “ Come again, come again ! ” 

“ Ay, think o’ that now,” said Mr. Poyser, when Adam 
was out on the causeway. “ Sitting up till past twelve to do 
extry work! Ye’ll not find many men o’ six-an’-twenty as 
’ull do to put i’ the shafts wi’ him. If you can catch Adam 
for a husband, Hetty, you ’ll ride i’ your own spring-cart 
some day, I ’ll be your warrant.” 

Hetty was moving across the kitchen with the currants, 
so her uncle did not see the little toss of the head with 
which she answered him. To ride in a spring-cart seemed 
a very miserable lot indeed to her now. 


234 


THE NIGHT-SCHOOL AND SCHOOLMASTER 


CHAPTER XXL 

THE NIGHT-SCHOOL AND THE SCHOOLMASTER. 

B ARTLE MASSEY’S was one of a few scattered 
houses on the edge of a common, which was divided 
by the road to Treddleston. Adam reached it in a quarter 
of an hour after leaving the Hall Farm; and when he had 
his hand on the door-latch, he could see, through the cur- 
tainless window, that there were eight or nine heads bend- 
ing over the desks, lighted by thin dips. 

When he entered, a reading lesson was going forward; 
and Bartle Massey merely nodded, leaving him to take his 
place where he pleased. He had not come for the sake of 
a lesson to-night, and his mind was too full of personal mat- 
ters, too full of the last two hours he had passed in Hetty’s 
presence, for him to amuse himself with a book till school 
was over; so he sat down in a corner, and looked on with 
an absent mind. It was a sort of scene which Adam had be- 
held almost weekly for years; he knew by heart every ara- 
besque flourish in the framed specimen of Bartle Massey’s 
handwriting which hung over the schoolmaster’s head, by 
way of keeping a lofty ideal before the minds of his pupils ; 
he knew the backs of all the books on the shelf running 
along the whitewashed wall above the pegs for the slates; 
he knew exactly how many grains were gone out of the ear 
of Indian-corn that hung from one of the rafters; he had 
long ago exhausted the resources of his imagination in try- 
ing to think how the bunch of leathery seaweed had looked 
and grown in its native element ; and from the place where 
he sat, he could make nothing of the old map of England 
that hung against the opposite wall, for age had turned it of 
a fine yellow brown, something like that of a well-seasoned 
meerschaum. The drama that was going on was almost 
as familiar as the scene ; nevertheless habit had not made 
him indifferent to it, and even in his present self-absorbed 
mood, Adam felt a momentary stirring of the old fellow- 
feeling, as he looked at the rough men painfully holding pen 

235 


ADAM BEDE 


or pencil with their cramped hands, or humbly labouring 
through the reading lesson. 

The reading class now seated on the form in front of the 
schoolmaster ’s desk consisted of the three most backward 
pupils. Adam would have known it only by seeing Bartle 
Massey’s face as he looked over his spectacles, which he 
had shifted to the ridge of his nose, not requiring them for 
present purposes. The face wore its mildest expression ; the 
grizzled bushy eyebrows had taken their more acute angle 
of compassionate kindness ; and the mouth, habitually com- 
pressed with a pout of the lower lip, was relaxed so as to be 
ready to speak a helpful word or syllable in a moment. This 
gentle expression was the more interesting because the 
schoolmaster’s nose, an irregular aquiline twisted a little on 
one side, had a rather formidable character; and his brow, 
moreover, had that peculiar tension which always impresses 
one as a sign of a keen, impatient temperament, — the blue 
veins stood out like cords under the transparent yellow 
skin; and this intimidating brow was softened by no ten- 
dency to baldness, for the gray bristly hair, cut down to 
about an inch in length, stood round it in as close ranks as 
ever. 

Nay, Bill, nay,” Bartle was saying in a kind tone, as he 
nodded to Adam, “ begin that again, and then, perhaps, it ’ll 
come to you what dry spells. It ’s the same lesson you 
read last week, you know.” 

“ Bill ” was a sturdy fellow, aged four-and-twenty, an ex- 
cellent stone-sawyer, who could get as good wages as any 
man in the trade of his years ; but he found a reading lesson 
in words of one syllable a harder matter to deal with than 
the hardest stone he had ever had to saw. The letters, he 
complained, were so uncommon alike, there was no tellin ’ 
’em one from another,” — the sawyer’s business not being 
concerned with minute differences such as exist between 
a letter with its tail turned up and a letter with its tail 
turned down. But Bill had a firm determination that he 
would learn to read, founded chiefly on two reasons: first, 
that Tom Hazel ow, his cousin, could read anything “ right 
off,” whether it was print or writing, and Tom had sent him 
a letter from twenty miles off, saying how he was prospering 

236 


THE NIGHT-SCHOOL AND SCHOOLMASTER 


in the world, and had got an overlooker’s place; secondly, 
that Sam Phillips, who sawed with him, had learned to read 
when he was turned twenty; and what could be done by a 
little fellow like Sam Phillips, Bill considered, could be done 
by himself, seeing that he could pound Sam into wet clay 
if circumstances required it. So here he was, pointing his 
big finger toward three words at once, and turning his head 
on one side that he might keep better hold with his eye of 
the one word which was to be discriminated out of the 
group. The amount of knowledge Bartle Massey must pos- 
sess was something so dim and vast that Bill’s imagination 
recoiled before it ; and he would hardly have ventured to 
deny that the schoolmaster might have something to do in 
bringing about the regular return of daylight and the 
changes in the weather. 

The man seated next to Bill was of a very different type ; 
he was a Methodist brickmaker, who, after spending thirty 
years of his life in perfect satisfaction with his ignorance, 
had lately “ got religion,” and along with it the desire to 
read the Bible. But with him, too, learning was a heavy 
business, and on his way out to-night he had offered as 
usual a special prayer for help, seeing that he had under- 
taken this hard task with a single eye to the nourishment 
of his soul, — that he might have a greater abundance of 
texts and hymns wherewith to banish evil memories and the 
temptations of old habits, or, in brief language, the devil. 
For the brickmaker had been a notorious poacher, and was 
suspected, though there was no good evidence against him, 
of being the man who had shot a neighbouring gamekeeper 
in the leg. However that might be, it is certain that shortly 
after the accident referred to, which was coincident with 
the arrival of an awakening Methodist preacher at Tred- 
dleston, a great change had been observed in the brick- 
maker; and though he was still known in the neighbour- 
hood by his old sobriquet of “ Brimstone,” there was nothing 
he held so much in horror as any further transactions with 
that evil-smelling element. He was a broad-chested fellow, 
with a fervid temperament, which helped him better in im- 
bibing religious ideas than in the dry process of acquiring 
the mere human knowledge of the alphabet. Indeed, he 

237 


ADAM BEDE 


had been already a little shaken in his resolution by a 
brother Methodist, who assured him that the letter was a 
mere obstruction to the Spirit, and expressed a fear that 
Brimstone was too eager for the knowledge that puffeth up. 

The third beginner was a much more promising pupil. 
He was a tall but thin and wiry man, nearly as old as Brim- 
stone, with a very pale face, and hands stained a deep blue. 
He was a dyer, who in the course of dipping homespun 
wool and old women’s petticoats, had got fired with the 
ambition to learn a great deal more about the strange se- 
crets of colour. He had already a high reputation in the 
district for his dyes, and he was bent on discovering some 
method by which he could reduce the expense of crimsons 
and scarlets. The druggist at Treddleston had given him a 
notion that he might save himself a great deal of labour and 
expense if he could learn to read, and so he had begun to 
give his spare hours to the night-school, resolving that his 

little chap ” should lose no time in coming to Mr. Mas- 
sey’s day-school as soon as he was old enough. 

It was touching to see these three big men, with the 
marks of their hard labour about them, anxiously bending 
over the worn books, and painfully making out, “ The grass 
is green,” “ The sticks are dry,” “ The corn is ripe,” — a 
very hard lesson to pass after columns of single words all 
alike except in the first letter. It was almost as if three 
rough animals were making humble efforts to learn how 
they might become human. And it touched the tenderest 
fibre in Bartle Massey’s nature, for such full-grown chil- 
dren as these were the only pupils for whom he had no 
severe epithets and no impatient tones. He was not gifted 
with an imperturbable temper, and on music-nights it was 
apparent that patience could never be an easy virtue to 
him ; but this evening, as he glances over his spectacles at 
Bill Downes, the sawyer, who is turning his head on one 
side with a desperate sense of blankness before the letters 
d, r, y, his eyes shed their mildest and most encouraging 
light. 

After the reading class, two youths, between sixteen and 
nineteen, came up with imaginary bills of parcels, which 
they had been writing out on their slates, and were now 

238 


THE NIGHT-SCHOOL AND SCHOOLMASTER 


required to calculate ‘‘ off-hand,” — a test which they stood 
with such imperfect success that Bartle Massey, whose eyes 
had been glaring at them ominously through his spectacles 
for some minutes, at length burst out in a bitter, high- 
pitched tone, pausing between every sentence to rap the 
floor with a knobbed stick which rested between his legs. 

“ Now, you see, you don’t do this thing a bit better than 
you did a fortnight ago ; and I ’ll tell you what ’s the reason. 
You want to learn accounts; that’s well and good. But 
you think all you need do to learn accounts is to come to 
me and do sums for an hour or so, two or three times a 
week ; and no sooner do you get your caps on and turn out 
of doors again, than you sweep the whole thing clean out of 
your mind. You go whistling about, and take no more care 
what you ’re thinking of than if your heads were gutters for 
any rubbish to swill through that happened to be in the 
way ; and if you get a good notion in ’em, it ’s pretty soon 
washed out again. You think knowledge is to be got cheap, 
— you ’ll come and pay Bartle Massey sixpence a week, and 
he ’ll make you clever at figures without your taking any 
trouble. But knowledge is n’t to be got with paying six- 
pence, let me tell you ; if you ’re to know figures, you must 
turn ’em over in your heads, and keep your thoughts fixed 
on ’em. There ’s nothing you can’t turn into a sum, for 
there ’s nothing but what ’s got number in it, — even a fool. 
^ I’m one fool, and Jack’s another; if my fool’s head weighed 
four pound, and Jack’s three pound three ounces and three 
quarters, how many pennyweights heavier would my head 
be than Jack’s? ’ A man that had got his heart in learning 
figures would make sums for himself, and work ’em in his 
head ; when he sat at his shoemaking, he ’d count his 
stitches by fives, and then put a price on his stitches, say 
half a farthing, and then see how much money he could get 
in an hour ; and then ask himself how much money he ’d 
get in a day at that rate ; and then how much ten workmen 
would get working three, or twenty, or a hundred years at 
that rate, — and all the while his needle would be going 
just as fast as if he left his head empty for the devil to dance 
in. But the long and short of it is, — I ’ll have nobody in my 
night-school that does n’t strive to learn what he comes to 

239 


ADAM BEDE 


learn, as hard as if he was striving to get out of a dark hole 
into broad daylight. I dl send no man away because he ’s 
stupid; if Billy Taft, the idiot, wanted to learn anything, 
I ’d not refuse to teach him. But I ’ll not throw away good 
knowledge on people who think they can get it by the six- 
penn’orth, and carry it away with ’em as they would an 
ounce of snuff. So never come to me again, if you can’t 
show that you ’ve been working with your own heads, in- 
stead of thinking you can pay for mine to work for you. 
That ’s the last word I ’ve got to say to you.” 

With this final sentence Bartle Massey gave a sharper rap 
than ever with his knobbed stick, and the discomfited lads 
got up to go with a sulky look. The other pupils had happily 
only their writing-books to show, in various stages of pro- 
gress from pot-hooks to round text; and mere pen-strokes, 
however perverse, were less exasperating to Bartle than 
false arithmetic. He was a little more severe than usual on 
Jacob Storey’s Z’s, of which poor Jacob had written a page- 
ful, all with their tops turned the wrong way, with a puzzled 
sense that they were not right “ somehow.” But he ob- 
served in apology, that it was a letter you never wanted 
hardly, and he thought it had only been put there “ to finish 
off th’ alphabet, like, though ampus-and (&) would ha' 
done as well, for what he could see.” 

At last the pupils had all taken their hats and said their 
“ Good-nights ;” and Adam, knowing his old master’s 
habits, rose and said, “ Shall I put the candles out, Mr. 
Massey ? ” 

Yes, my boy, yes, all but this, which I ’ll carry into the 
house ; and just lock the outer door, now you ’re near it,” 
said Bartle, getting his stick in the fitting angle to help him 
in descending from his stool. He was no sooner on the 
ground than it become obvious why the stick was necessary, 
— the left leg was much shorter than the right. But the 
schoolmaster was so active with his lameness, that it was 
hardly thought of as a misfortune ; and if you had seen him 
make his way along the schoolroom floor, and up the step 
into his kitchen, you would perhaps have understood why 
the naughty boys sometimes felt that his pace might be in- 


240 


THE NIGHT-SCHOOL AND SCHOOLMASTER 


definitely quickened, and that he and'^his stick might over- 
take them even in their swiftest run. 

The moment he appeared at the kitchen door with the 
candle in his hand, a faint whimpering began in the chim- 
ney-corner, and a brown-and-tan-coloured bitch, of that 
wise-looking breed with short legs and long body, known 
to an unmechanical generation as turnspits, came creeping 
along the floor, wagging her tail, and hesitating at every 
other step, as if her affections were painfully divided be- 
tween the hamper in the chimney-corner and the master, 
whom she could not leave without a greeting. 

“ Well, Vixen, well then, how are the babbies? ” said the 
schoolmaster, making haste towards the chimney-corner, 
and holding the candle over the low hamper, where two ex- 
tremely blind puppies lifted up their heads towards the 
light, from a nest of flannel and wool. Vixen could not even 
see her master look at them without painful excitement ; 
she got into the hamper and got out again the next mo- 
ment, and behaved with true feminine folly, though look- 
ing all the while as wise as a dwarf with a large old-fash- 
ioned head and body on the most abbreviated legs. 

“ Why, you Ve got a family, I see, Mr. Massey,’^ said 
Adam, smiling, as he came into the kitchen. “ How that ? 
I thought it was against the law here.” 

“ Law ? What ’s the use o’ law when a man ’s once such 
a fool as to let a woman into his house?” said Bartle, turn- 
ing away from the hamper with some bitterness. He always 
called Vixen a woman, and seemed to have lost all con- 
sciousness that he was using a figure of speech. “ If I ’d 
known Vixen was a woman, I ’d never have held the boys 
from drowning her ; but when I ’d got her into my hand, I 
was forced to take her. And now you see what she ’s 
brought me to, — the sly, hypocritical wench,” — Bartle 
spoke these last words. in a rasping tone of reproach, and 
looked at Vixen, who poked down her head and turned up 
her eyes towards him with a keen sense of opprobrium, — 
‘‘ and contrived to be brought to bed on a Sunday at 
church-time. I Ve wished again and again I ’d been a 
bloody-minded man, that I could have strangled the mother 
and the brats with one cord.” 

1 6 


241 


ADAM BEDE 


I ’m glad it was no worse a cause kept you from 
church,” said Adam. “ I was afraid you must be ill for the 
first time i’ your life ; and I was particular sorry not to have 
you at church yesterday.” 

Ah, my boy, I know why, I know why,” said Bartle, 
kindly, going up to Adam, and raising his hand up to the 
shoulder that was almost on a level with his own head. 
“You Ve had a rough bit o' road to get over since I saw 
you, — a rough bit o' road. But I 'm in hopes there are 
better times coming for you. I 've got some news to tell 
you. But I must get my supper, first, for I 'm hungry, I 'm 
hungry. Sit down, sit down.” 

Bartle went into his little pantry, and brought out an ex- 
cellent home-baked loaf ; for it was his one extravagance in 
these dear times to eat bread once a day instead of oat-cake ; 
and he justified it by observing that what a schoolmaster 
wanted was brains, and oat-cake ran too much to bone in- 
stead of brains. Then came a piece of cheese, and a quart 
jug with a crown of foam upon it. He placed them all on 
the round deal table which stood against his large arm- 
chair in the chimney-corner, with Vixen’s hamper on one 
side of it, and a window-shelf with a few books piled up in 
it on the other. The table was as clean as if Vixen had been 
an excellent housewife in a checkered apron ; so was the 
quarry floor; and the old carved oaken press, table, and 
chairs — which in these days would be bought at a high 
price in aristocratic houses, though, in that period of spider- 
legs and inlaid cupids, Bartle had got them for an old song 
— were as free from dust as things could be at the end of a 
summer's day. 

“ Now, then, my boy, draw up, draw up. We 'll not talk 
about business till we 'e had our supper. No man can 
be wise on an empty stomach. But,” said Bartle, rising 
from his chair again, “ I must give Vixen her supper too, 
confound her ! though she 'll do nothing with it but nourish 
those unnecessary babbies. That 's the way with these 
women ; they Ve got no head-pieces to nourish, and so their 
food all runs either to fat or to brats.” 

He brought out of the pantry a dish of scraps, which 


242 


THE NIGHT-SCHOOL AND SCHOOLMASTER 


Vixen at once fixed her eyes on, and jumped out of her 
hamper to lick up with the utmost despatch. 

“ I ’ve had my supper, Mr. Massey,” said Adam, so I ’ll 
look on while you eat yours. I ’ve been at the Hall Farm, 
and they always have their supper betimes, you know ; they 
don’t keep your late hours.” 

“ I know little about their hours,” said Bartle, dryly, cut- 
ting his bread and not shrinking from the crust. “ It ’s a 
house I seldom go into, though I ’m fond of the boys, and 
Martin Poyser ’s a good fellow. There ’s too many women 
in the house for me; I hate the sound of women’s voices; 
they ’re always either a-buzz or a-squeak, — always either 
a-buzz or a-squeak. Mrs. Poyser keeps at the top o’ the 
talk like a fife ; and as for the young lasses, I ’d as soon look 
at water-grubs, — I know what they ’ll turn to, — stinging 
gnats, stinging gnats. Here, take some ale, my boy ; it ’s 
been drawn for you, — it ’s been drawn for you.” 

“ Nay, Mr. Massey,” said Adam, who took his old 
friend’s whim more seriously than usual to-night, “ don’t 
be so hard on the creaturs God has made to be companions 
for us. A working man ’ud be badly off without a wife to 
see to th’ house and the victual, and make things clean and 
comfortable.” 

“ Nonsense ! It ’s the silliest lie a sensible man like you 
ever believed, to say a woman makes a house comfortable. 
It ’s a story got up because the women are there, and some- 
thing. must be found for ’em to do. I tell you there is n’t a 
thing under the sun that needs to be done at all, but what 
a man can do better than a woman, unless it ’s bearing chil- 
dren, and they do that in a poor make-shift way ; it had bet- 
ter ha’ been left to the men. I tell you, a woman ’ull bake 
you a pie every week of her life, and never come to see that 
the hotter th’ oven the shorter the time. I tell you, a wom- 
an ’ull make a porridge every day for twenty years, and 
never think of measuring the proportion between the meal 
and the milk, — a little more or less, she ’ll think, does n’t 
signify ; the porridge will be awk’ard now and then ; if it ’s 
wrong, it ’s summat in the meal, or it ’s summat in the milk, 
or it ’s summat in the water. Look at me ! I make m.y 
own bread, and there ’s no difference between one batch and 


243 


ADAM BEDE 


another from year’s end to year’s end ; but if I ’d got any 
other woman besides Vixen in the house, I must pray to the 
Lord every baking to give me patience if the bread turned 
out heavy. And as for cleanliness, my house is cleaner than 
any other house on the Common, though the half of ’em 
swarm with women. Will Baker’s lad comes to help me in 
a morning, and we get as much cleaning done in one hour 
without any fuss, as a woman ’ud get done in three, and all 
the while be sending buckets o’ water after your ankles, 
and let the fender and the fire-irons stand in the middle o’ 
the floor half the day, for you to break your shins against 
’em. Don’t tell me about God having made such creatures 
to be companions for us ! I don’t say but he might make 
Eve to be a companion to Adam in Paradise, — there was 
no cooking to be spoilt there, and no other woman to cackle 
with and make mischief; though you see what mischief 
she did as soon as she ’d an opportunity. But it ’s an im- 
pious, unscriptural opinion to say a woman ’s a blessing to 
a man now; you might as well say adders and wasps and 
foxes and wild beasts are a blessing, when they ’re only the 
evils that belong to this state o’ probation, which it ’s law- 
ful for a man to keep as clear of as he can in this life, hoping 
to get quit of ’em forever in another, — hoping to get quit 
of ’em forever in another.” 

Bartle had become so excited and angry in the course of 
his. invective that he had forgotten his supper, and only used 
the knife for the purpose of rapping the table with the haft. 
But towards the close the raps became so sharp and fre- 
quent, and his voice so quarrelsome, that Vixen felt it in- 
cumbent on her to jump out of the hamper and bark 
vaguely. 

“ Quiet, Vixen !” snarled Bartle, turning round upon her. 

You ’re like the rest o’ the women, — always putting in 
your word before you know why.” 

Vixen returned to her hamper again in humiliation, and 
her master continued his supper in a silence which Adam 
did not choose to interrupt ; he knew the old man would be 
in a better humour when he had had his supper and lighted 
his pipe. Adam was used to hear him talk in this way, but 
had never learned so much of Bartle’s past life as to know 

244 


THE NIGHT-SCHOOL AND SCHOOLMASTER 


whether his view of married comfort was founded on experi- 
ence. On that point Bartle was mute ; and it was even a 
secret where he had lived previous to the twenty years in 
which, happily for the peasants and artisans of this neigh- 
bourhood, he had been settled among them as their only 
schoolmaster. If anything like a question was ventured on 
this subject, Bartle always replied, “ Oh, I Ve seen many 
places, — I Ve been a deal in the south and the Loamshire 
men would as soon have thought of asking for a particular 
town or village in Africa as in “ the south.” 

“ Now, then, my boy,” said Bartle, at last, when he had 
poured out his second mug of ale and lighted his pipe, — 
“ now then, we ’ll have a little talk. But tell me first, have 
you heard any particular news to-day ? ” 

“ No,” said Adam, “ not as I remember.” 

Ah, they ’ll keep it close, they ’ll keep it close, I dare 
say. But I found it out by chance ; and it ’s news that may 
concern you, Adam, else I ’m a man that don’t know a 
superficial square foot from a solid.” 

Here Bartle gave a series of fierce and rapid puffs, look- 
ing earnestly the while at Adam. Your impatient loquacious 
man has never any notion of keeping his pipe alight by gen- 
tle measured puffs ; he is always letting it go nearly out, and 
then punishing it for that negligence. At last he said, — 
Satchell ’s got a paralytic stroke. I found it out from 
the lad they sent to Treddleston for the doctor, before seven 
o’clock this morning. He ’s a good way beyond sixty, you 
know ; it ’s much if he gets over it.” 

‘‘ Well,” said Adam, I dare say there ’d be more re- 
joicing than sorrow in the parish at his being laid up. He ’s 
been a selfish, tale-bearing, mischievous fellow; but, after 
all, there ’s nobody he ’s done so much harm as to th’ old 
Squire. Though it ’s the Squire himself as is to blame, — 
making a stupid fellow like that a sort o’ man-of-all-work, 
just to save th’ expense of having a proper steward to look 
after th’ estate. And he ’s lost more by ill-management o’ 
the woods, I ’ll be bound, than ’ud pay for two stewards. If 
he ’s laid on the shelf, it ’s to be hoped he ’ll make way 
for a better man ; but I don’t see how it ’s like to make any 
difference to me.” 


245 


ADAM BEDE 


“ But I see it, but I see it,” said Bartle ; and others be- 
sides me. The Captain ’s coming of age now, — you know 
that as well as I do, — and it ’s to be expected he ’ll have a 
little more voice in things. And I know, and you know, 
too, what ’ud be the Captain’s wish about the woods, if 
there was a fair opportunity for making a change. He ’s 
said, in plenty of people’s hearing, that he ’d make you 
manager of the woods to-morrow, if he ’d the power. Why, 
Carroll, Mr. Irwine’s butler, heard him say so to the parson 
not many days ago. Carroll looked in when we were smok*- 
ing our pipes o’ Saturday night at Casson’s, and he told 
us about it; and whenever anybody says a good word for 
you, the parson ’s ready to back it, that I ’ll answer for. 
It was pretty well talked over, I can tell you, at Casson’s, 
and one after another had their fling at you ; for if donkeys 
set to work to sing, you ’re pretty sure what the tune ’ll be.” 

“ Why did they talk it over before Mr. Burge ?” said 
Adam ; “ or was n’t he there o’ Saturday? ” 

“ Oh, he went away before Carroll came ; and Casson — 
he ’s always for setting other folks right, you know — 
would have it Burge was the man to have the management 
of the woods. ‘ A substantial man,’ says he, ‘ with pretti- 
near sixty years’ experience o’ timber; it ’ud be all very 
well for Adam Bede to act under him, but it is n’t to be 
supposed the Squire ’ud appoint a young fellow like Adam, 
when there ’s his elders and betters at hand ! ’ But I said, 
‘ That ’s a pretty notion o’ yours, Casson. Why, Burge is 
the man to huy timber; would you put the woods into his 
hands and let him make his own bargains? I think yon 
don’t leave your customers to score their own drink, do 
you ? And as for age, what that ’s worth depends on the 
quality o’ the liquor. It ’s pretty well known who’s the 
backbone o’ Jonathan Burge’s business.’ ” 

I thank you for your good word, Mr. Massey,” said 
Adam. “ But, for all that, Casson was partly i’ the right 
for once. There ’s not much likelihood that th’ old Squire 
’ud ever consent t’ employ me; I offended him about two 
years ago, and he ’s never forgiven me.” 

“ Why, how was that? You never told me about it,” said 
Bartle. 


246 


THE NIGHT-SCHOOL AND SCHOOLMASTERS 

“ Oh, it was a bit o’ nonsense I ’d made a frame^ for a 
screen for Miss Lyddy, — she ’s allays making something 
with her worsted-work, you know, — and she ’d given me 
particular orders about this screen, and there was as much 
talking and measuring as if we 'd been planning a house. 
However, it was a nice bit o’ work, anrj I liked doing it for 
her. But, you know, those little friggling things take a 
great deal o’ time. I only worked at it in over-hours, — 
often late at night, — and I had to go to Treddleston over 
an’ over again, about little bits o’ brass nails and such gear ; 
and I turned the little knobs and the legs, and carved th’ 
open work, after a pattern, as nice as could be. And I was 
uncommon pleased with it when it was done. And when I 
took it home. Miss Lyddy sent for me to bring it into her 
drawing-room, so as she might give me directions about fas- 
tening on the work, — very fine needlework, Jacob and 
Rachel a-kissing one another among the sheep, like a pic- 
ture, — and th’ old Squire was sitting there, for he mostly 
sits with her. Well, she was mighty pleased with the screen, 
and then she wanted to know what pay she was to give me. 
I did n’t speak quite at random, — you know it ’s not my 
way ; I ’d calculated pretty close, though I had n’t made out 
a bill, and I said, ‘ One pound thirteen.’ That was paying 
for the mater’als and paying me, but none too much, for my 
work. Th’ old Squire looked up at this, and peered in his 
way at the screen, and said, ‘ One pound thirteen for a gim- 
crack like that! Lydia, my dear, if you must spend money 
on these things, why don’t you get them at Rosseter, in- 
stead of paying double price for clumsy work here? Such 
things are not work for a carpenter like Adam. Give him a 
guinea, and no more.’ Well, Miss Lyddy, I reckon, believed 
what he told her, and she ’s not over-fond o’ parting with 
the money herself, — she ’s not a bad woman at bottom, but 
she ’s been brought up under his thumb ; so she began 
fidgeting with her purse, and turned as red as her ribbon. 
But I made a bow, and said, ‘ No, thank you, madam ; I ’ll 
make you a present o’ the screen, if you please. I ’ve 
charged the regular price for my work, and I know it ’s 
done well; and I know, begging his honor’s pardon, that 
you couldn’t get such a screen at Rosseter under two 

247 


ADAM BEDE 


guineas. I ’m willing to give you my work, — it ’s been 
done in my own time, and nobody ’s got anything to do with 
it but me ; but if I ’m paid, I can’t take a smaller price than 
I asked, because that ’ud be like saying I ’d asked more than 
was just. With your leave, madam, I ’ll bid you good morn- 
ing.’ I made my bow and went out before she ’d time to 
say any more, for she stood with the purse in her hand, 
looking almost foolish. I did n’t mean to be disrespectful, 
and I spoke as polite as I could; but I can give in to no 
man, if he wants to make it out as I ’m trying to overreach 
him. And in the evening the footman brought me the one 
pound thirteen wrapped in paper. But since then I ’ve seen 
pretty clear as th’ old Squire can’t abide me.” 

That ’s likely enough, that ’s likely enough,” said 
Bartle, meditatively. “ The only way to bring him round 
would be to show him what was for his own interest ; and 
that the Captain may do, — that the Captain may do.” 

“ Nay, I don’t know,” said Adam ; ‘‘ the Squire ’s ’cute 
enough, but it takes something else besides ’cuteness to 
make folks see what ’ll be their interest in the long-run. It 
takes some conscience and belief in right and wrong, I see 
that pretty clear. You ’d hardly ever bring round th’ old 
Squire to believe he ’d gain as much in a straightfor’ard 
way as by tricks and turns. And, besides, I Ve not much 
mind to work under him ; I don’t want to quarrel with any 
gentleman, more particular an old gentleman turned eighty, 
and I know we could n’t agree long. If the Captain was 
master o’ th’ estate, it ’ud be different ; he ’s got a conscience 
and a will to do right, and I ’d sooner work for him nor for 
any man living.” 

“ Well, well, my boy, if good luck knocks at your door, 
don’t you put your head out at window and tell it to be 
gone about its business, that ’s all. You must learn to deal 
with odd and even in life, as well as in figures. I tell you 
now, as I told you ten years ago, when you pommelled 
young Mike Holdsworth for wanting to pass a bad shilling, 
before you knew whether he was in jest or earnest, — 
you ’re over-hasty and proud, and apt to set your teeth 
against folks that don’t square to your notions. It’s no harm 
for me to be a bit fiery and stiff -backed ; I ’m an old school - 

248 


THE NIGHT-SCHOOL AND SCHOOLMASTER 


master, and shall never want to get on to a higher perch. 
But where ’s the use of all the time I Ve spent in teaching 
you writing and mapping and mensuration, if you Te not 
to get for’ard in the world, and show folks there ’s some 
advantage in having a head on your shoulders, instead of 
a turnip? Do you mean to go on turning up your nose at 
every opportunity, because it ’s got a bit of a smell about it 
that nobody finds out but yourself ? It ’s as foolish as that 
notion o’ yours that a wife is to make a working man com- 
fortable. Stuff and nonsense ! — stuff and nonsense ! Leave 
that to fools that never got beyond* a sum in simple addi- 
tion. Simple addition enough ! Add one fool to another 
fool, and in six years’ time six fools more, — they ’re all of 
the same denomination, big and little ’s nothing to do with 
the sum ! 

During this rather heated exhortation to coolness and 
discretion the pipe had gone out, and Bartle gave the cli- 
max to his speech by striking a light furiously, after which 
he puffed with fierce resolution, fixing his eye still on Adam, 
who was trying not to laugh. 

There ’s a good deal o’ sense in what you say, Mr. Mas- 
sey,” Adam began, as soon as he felt quite serious, as there 
always is. But you ’ll give in that it ’s no business o’ mine 
to be building on chances that may never happen. What 
I ’ve got to do is to work as well as I can with the tools and 
mater’als I ’ve got in my hands. If a good chance comes to 
me, I ’ll think o’ what you ’ve been saying ; but till then, 
I ’ve got nothing to do but to trust to my own hands and 
my own headpiece. I ’m turning over a little plan for Seth 
and me to go into the cabinet-making a bit by ourselves, 
and win a extra pound or two in that way. But it ’s get- 
ting late now, — it ’ll be pretty near eleven before I ’m at 
home, and mother may happen to lie awake ; she ’s more 
fidgety nor usual now. So I ’ll bid you good-night.” 

Well, well, we ’ll go to the gate with you, — it ’s a fine 
night,” said Bartle, taking up his stick. Vixen was at once 
on her legs, and without further words the three walked out 
into the starlight, by the side of Bartle’s potato-beds, to the 
little gate. 

‘‘ Come to the music o’ Friday night, if you can, my boy,” 
249 


ADAM BEDE 


said the old man, as he closed the gate ofter Adam, and 
leaned against it. 

Ay, ay,’’ said Adam, striding along towards the streak 
of pale road. He was the only object moving on the wide 
Common. The two gray donkeys, just visible in front of 
the gorse bushes, stood as still as limestone images, as still 
as the gray-thatched roof of the mud cottage a little farther 
on. Bartle kept his eye on the moving figure till it passed 
into the darkness; while Vixen, in a state of divided affec- 
tion, had twice run back to the house to bestow a paren- 
thetic lick on her puppies. 

Ay, ay,” muttered the schoolmaster, as Adam disap- 
peared ; there you go, stalking along, — stalking along ; 
but you would n’t have been what you are if you had n’t had 
a bit of old lame Bartle inside you. The strongest calf must 
have something to suck at. There ’s plenty of these big, 
lumbering fellows ud never have known their a b c, if it 
had n’t been for Bartle Massey. Well, well. Vixen, you fool- 
ish wench, what is it, what is it ? I must go in, must I ? Ay, 
ay, I ’m never to have a will o’ my own any more. And 
those pups, what do you think I ’m to do with ’em, when 
they ’re twice as big as 3^ou ? — for I ’m pretty sure the 
father was that hulking bull-terrier of Will Baker’s — 
wasn’t he now, eh, you sly hussy?” (Here Vixen tucked 
her tail between her legs and ran forward into the house. 
Subjects are sometimes broached which a well-bred female 
will ignore.) 

But where ’s the use of talking to a woman with bab- 
bies ?” continued Bartle : she ’s got no conscience, — no 
conscience ; it ’s all run to milk.” 


250 


BOOK III. 


CHAPTER XXIL 

GOING TO THE BIRTHDAY FEAST. 

T he 30th of July was come, and it was one of those 
half-dozen warm days which sometimes occur in the 
middle of a rainy English summer. No rain had fallen for 
the last three or four days, and the weather was perfect for 
that time of the year; there was less dust than usual on the 
dark-green hedgerows, and on the wild camomile that 
starred the roadside, yet the grass was dry enough for the 
little children to roll on it, and there was no cloud but a 
long dash of light, downy ripple, high, high up in the far- 
off blue sky. Perfect weather for an outdoor July merry- 
making, yet surely not the best time of year to be born in. 
Nature seems to make a hot pause just then, — all the love- 
liest flowers are gone ; the sweet time of early growth and 
vague hopes is past; and yet the time of harvest and in- 
gathering is not come, and we tremble at the possible storms 
that may ruin the precious fruit in the moment of its ripe- 
ness. The woods are all one dark monotonous green; the 
wagon-loads of hay no longer creep along the lanes, scat- 
tering their sweet-smelling fragments on the blackberry 
branches; the pastures are often a little tanned, yet the 
corn has not got its last splendour of red and gold; the 
lambs and calves have lost all traces of their innocent, frisky 
prettiness, and have become stupid young sheep and cows. 
But it is a time of leisure on the farm, — that pause between 
hay and corn harvest; and so the farmers and labourers in 
Hayslope and Broxton thought the Captain did well to come 
of age just then, when they could give their undivided minds 
to the flavour of the great cask of ale which had been brewed 
the autumn after “ the heir ” was born, and was to be tapped 
on his twenty-first birthday. The air had been merry with 

251 


ADAM BEDE 


the ringing of church-bells very early this morning, and 
every one had made haste to get through the needful work 
before twelve, when it would be time to think of getting 
ready to go to the Chase. 

The mid-day sun was streaming into Hetty’s bed-cham- 
ber, and there was no blind to temper the heat "with which 
it fell on her head as she looked at herself in the old specked 
glass. Still, that was the only glass she had in which she 
could see her neck and arms, for the small hanging glass 
she had fetched out of the next room — the room that had 
been Dinah’s — would show her nothing below her little 
chin, and that beautiful bit of neck where the roundness of 
her cheek melted into another roundness shadowed by dark 
delicate curls. And to-day she thought more than usual 
about her neck and arms ; for at the dance this evening she 
was not to wear any neckerchief, and she had been busy yes- 
terday with her spotted pink-and-white frock, that she might 
n:ake the sleeves either long or short at will. She was 
dressed now just as she was to be in the evening, wdth 
a tucker made of “ real ” lace, which her aunt had lent her 
for this unparalleled occasion, but with no ornaments be- 
sides; she had even taken out her small round ear-rings 
which she wore every day. But there was something more 
to be done, apparently, before she put on her neckerchief 
and long sleeves, which she was to wear in the daytime, for 
now she unlocked the drawer that held her private treasures. 
It is more than a month since we saw her unlock that drawer 
before, and now it holds new treasures, so much more pre- 
cious than the old ones that these are thrus-t into the cor- 
ner. Hetty would not care to put the large coloured glass 
ear-rings into her ears now ; for see ! she has got a beautiful 
pair of gold and pearls and garnet, lying snugly in a pretty 
little box lined with white satin. Oh, the delight of taking 
out that little box and looking at the ear-rings ! Do not 
reason about it, my philosophical reader, and say that Hetty, 
being very pretty, must have known that it did not signify 
whether she had on any ornaments or not ; and that, more- 
over, to look at ear-rings which she could not possibly wear 
out of her bed-room could hardly be a satisfaction, the es- 
sence of vanity being a reference to the impressions pro- 

252 


GOING TO THE BIRTHDAY FEAST 


duced on others; you will never understand women’s na- 
tures if you are so excessively rational. Try rather to divest 
yourself of all your rational prejudices, as much as if you 
were studying the psychology of a canary-bird, and only 
watch the movements of this pretty round creature as she 
turns her head on one side with an unconscious smile at 
the ear-rings nestled in the little box. Ah, you think, it is 
for the sake of the person who has given them to her, and 
her thoughts are gone back now to the moment when they 
were put into her hands. No ; else why should she have 
cared to have ear-rings rather than anything else? and 1 
know that she had longed for ear-rings from among all the 
ornaments she could imagine. 

“ Little, little ears ! ” Arthur had said, pretending to pinch 
them one evening, as Hetty sat beside him on the grass with- 
out her hat. “ I wish I had some pretty ear-rings ! ” she said 
in a moment, almost before she knew what she was saying*, 
— the wish lay so close to her lips, it would flutter past 
them at the slightest breath. And the next day, — it was 
only last week, — Arthur had ridden over to Rosseter on 
purpose to buy them. That little wish so naively uttered 
seemed to him the prettiest bit of childishness ; he had never 
heard anything like it before ; and he had wrapped the box 
up in a great many covers, that he might see Hetty un- 
wrapping it with growing curiosity, till at last her eyes 
flashed back their new delight into his. 

No, she was not thinking most of the giver when she 
smiled at the ear-rings, for now she is taking them out of 
the box, not to press them to her lips, but to fasten them in 
her ears, — only for one moment to see how pretty they 
look, as she peeps at them in the glass against the wall, with 
first one position of the head and then another, like a listen- 
ing bird. It is impossible to be wise on the subject of ear- 
rings as one looks at her ; what should those delicate pearls 
and crystals be made for, if not for such ears ? One cannot 
even find fault with the tiny round hole which they leave 
when they are taken out ; perhaps water-nixies, and such 
lovely things without souls, have these little round holes in 
their ears by nature, ready to hang jewels in. And Hetty 
must be one of them : it is too painful to think that she is 

253 


ADAM BEDE 


a woman, with a woman’s destiny before her, — a woman 
spinning in young ignorance a light web of folly and vain 
hopes which may one day close round her and press upon 
her, a rancorous poisoned garment, changing all at once 
her fluttering, trivial butterfly sensations into a life of deep 
human anguish. 

But she cannot keep in the ear-rings long, else she may 
make her uncle and aunt wait. She puts them quickly into 
the box again, and shuts them up. Some day she will be 
able to wear any ear-rings she likes, and already she lives 
in an invisible world of brilliant costumes, shimmering gauze, 
soft satin, and velvet, such as the lady’s-maid at the Chase 
has shown her in Miss Lydia’s wardrobe; she feels the 
bracelets on her arms, and treads on a soft carpet in front of 
a tall mirror. But she has one thing in the drawer which 
she can venture to wear to-day, because she can hang it an 
the chain of dark-brown berries which she has been used to 
wear on grand days, with a tiny flat scent-bottle at the end 
of it tucked inside her frock ; and she must put on her 
brown berries, — her neck would look so unfinished with- 
out it. Hetty was not quite as fond of the locket as of 
the ear-rings, though it was a handsome large locket with 
enamelled flowers at the back and a beautiful gold border 
round the glass, which showed a light-brown slightly wav- 
ing lock, forming a background for two little dark rings. 
She must keep it under her clothes, and no one would see it. 
But Hetty had another passion, only a little less strong than 
her love of finery ; and that other passion made her like to 
wear the locket even hidden in her bosom. She would al- 
ways have worn it, if she had dared to encounter her aunt’s 
questions about a ribbon round her neck. So now she 
slipped it on along her chain of dark-brown berries, and 
snapped the chain round her neck. It was not a very long 
chain, only allowing the locket to hang a little way below 
the edge of her frock. And now she had nothing to do but 
to put on her long sleeves, her new white gauze neckerchief, 
and her straw hat trimmed with white to-day instead of the 
pink, which had become rather faded under the July sun. 
That hat made the drop of bitterness in Hetty’s cup to-day, 
for it was not quite new, — everybody would see that it was 

254 


GOING TO THE BIRTHDAY FEAST 


a little tanned against the white ribbon, — and Mary Burge, 
she felt sure, would have a new hat or bonnet on. She 
looked for consolation at her line white cotton stockings; 
they really were very nice indeed, and she had given almost 
all her spare money for them. Hetty’s dream of the future 
could not make her insensible to triumph in the present. To 
be sure. Captain Donnithorne loved her so, that he would 
never care about looking at other people ; but then those 
other people did n’t know how he loved her, and she was not 
satisfied to appear shabby and insignificant in their eyes 
even for a short space. 

The whole party was assembled in the house-place when 
Hetty went down, all of course in their Sunday clothes ; and 
the bells had been ringing so this morning in honour of the 
Captain’s twenty-first birthday, and the work had all been 
got done so early, that Marty and Tommy were not quite 
easy in their minds until their mother had assured them 
that going to church was not part of the day’s festivities. 
Mr. Poyser had once suggested that the house should be 
shut up, and left to take care of itself ; “ for,” said he, 
there ’s no danger of anybody’s breaking in, — everybody 
’ll be at the Chase, thieves an’ all. If we lock th’ house up, 
all the men can go ; it ’s a day they wonna see twice i’ their 
lives.” But Mrs. Poyser answered with great decision : “ I 
never left the house to take care of itself since I was a 
missis, and I never will. There ’s been ill-looking tramps 
enoo’ about the place this last week, to carry off every ham 
an’ every spoon we ’n got ; and they all collogue together, 
them tramps, as it ’s a mercy they hanna come and poisoned 
the dogs and murdered us all in our beds afore we knowed, 
some Friday night when we ’n got the money in th’ house 
to pay the men. And it ’s like enough the tramps know 
where we ’re going as well as we do oursens ; for if Old 
Harry wants any work done, you may be sure he ’ll find 
the means.” 

‘‘ Nonsense about murdering us in our beds,” said Mr. 
Poyser. “ I ’ve got a gun i’ our room, hanna I ? and thee ’st 
got ears as ’ud find it out if a mouse was gnawing the bacon. 
Howiver, if thee wouldstna be easy, Alick can stay at home i’ 
the forepart o’ the day, and Tim can come back tow’rds five 

255 


ADAM BEDE 


o’clock, and let Alick have his turn. They may let Growler 
loose if anybody offers to do mischief ; and there ’s Alick’s 
dog, too, ready enough to set his tooth in a tramp if Alick 
gives him a wink.” 

Mrs. Poyser accepted this compromise, but thought it 
advisable to bar and bolt to the utmost ; and now, at the last 
moment before starting, Nancy, the dairy-maid, was closing 
the shutters of the house-place, although the window, lying 
under the immediate observation of Alick and the dogs, 
might have been supposed the least likely to be selected for 
a burglarious attempt. 

The covered cart, without springs, was standing ready to 
carry the whole family except the men-servants. Mr. Poy- 
ser and the grandfather sat on the seat in front, and within 
there was room for all the women and children ; the fuller 
the cart the better, because then the jolting would not hurt 
so much, and Nancy’s broad person and thick arms were an 
excellent cushion to be pitched on. But Mr. Poyser drove at 
no more than a walking pace, that there might be as little 
risk of jolting as possible on this warm day; and there was 
time to exchange greetings and remarks with the foot-pas- 
sengers who were going the same way, specking the paths 
between the green meadows and the golden cornfields with 
bits of movable bright colour, — a scarlet waistcoat to 
match the poppies that nodded a little too thickly among 
the corn, or a dark-blue neckerchief with ends flaunting 
across a bran-new white smock-frock. All Broxton and all 
Hayslope were to be at the Chase, and make merry there in 
honour of th’ heir ; ” and the old men and women, who 
had never been so far down this side of the hill for the last 
twenty years, were being brought from Broxton and Hay- 
slope in one of the farmer’s wagons, at Mr. Irwine’s sug- 
gestion. The church-bells had struck up again now, — a 
last tune, before the ringers came down the hill to have 
their share in the festival ; and before the bells had finished, 
other music was heard approaching, so that even Old 
Brown, the sober horse that was drawing Mr. Poyser’s cart, 
began to prick up his ears. It was the band of the Benefit 
Club, which had mustered in all its glory ; that is to say, in 
bright-blue scarfs and blue favours, and carrying its banner 

256 


GOING TO THE BIRTHDAY FEAST 


with the motto, Let brotherly love continue/’ encircling a 
picture of a stone-pit. 

The carts, of course, were not to enter the Chase. Every 
one must get down at the lodges, and the vehicles must be 
sent back. 

Why, the Chase is like a fair a’ready,” said Mrs. Poyser, 
as she got down from the cart, and saw the groups scat- 
tered under the great oaks, and the boys running about in 
the hot sunshine to survey the tall poles surmounted by the 
fluttering garments that were to be the prize of the success- 
ful climbers. I should ha’ thought there wasna so many 
people i’ the two parishes. Mercy on us ! how hot it is out 
o’ the shade ! Come here, Totty, else your little face ’ull be 
burnt to a scratchin’ ! They might ha’ cooked the dinners i’ 
that open space, an’ saved the fires. I shall go to Mrs. 
Best’s room an’ sit down.” 

‘‘ Stop a bit, stop a bit,” said Mr. Poyser. There ’s th’ 
wagin coming wi’ th’ old folks in ’t ; it ’ll be such a sight 
as wonna come o’er again, to see ’em get down an’ walk 
along all together. You remember some on ’em i’ their 
prime, eh, father?” 

“ Ay, ay,” said old Martin, walking slowly under the 
shade of the lodge porch, from which he could see the aged 
party descend. “ I remember Jacob Taft walking fifty mile 
after the Scotch raybels, when they turned back from Stoni- 
ton.” 

He felt himself quite a youngster, with a long life before 
him, as he saw the Hayslope patriarch, old Feyther Taft, 
descend from the wagon and walk towards him, in his brown 
nightcap, and leaning on his two sticks. 

Well, Mester Taft,” shouted old Martin, at the utmost 
stretch of his voice, — for though he knew the old man was 
stone deaf, he could not omit the propriety of a greeting, — 
“ you ’re hearty yet. You can enjoy yoursen to-day, for all 
you ’re ninety an’ better.” 

Your sarvant, mesters, your sarvant,” said Feyther Taft 
in a treble tone, perceiving that he was in company. 

The aged group, under care of sons or daughters, them- 
selves worn and gray, passed on along the least-winding 
carriage-road towards the house, where a special table was 

257 


11 


ADAM BEDE 


prepared for them ; while the Poyser party wisely struck 
across the grass under the shade of the great trees, but not 
out of view of the house-front, with its sloping lawn and 
flower-beds, or of the pretty striped marquee at the edge 
of the lawn, standing at right angles with two larger mar- 
quees on each side of the open green space where the games 
were to be played. The house would have been nothing but 
a plain square mansion of Queen Anne’s time, but for the 
remnant of an old abbey to which it was united at one end, 
in much the same way as one may sometimes see a new 
farmhouse rising high and prim at the end of older and lower 
farm-offices. The fine old remnant stood a little backward 
and under the shadow of tall beeches ; but the sun was now 
on the taller and more advanced front, the blinds were all 
down, and the house seemed asleep in the hot mid-day. It 
made Hetty quite sad to look at it ; Arthur must be some- 
where in the back rooms, with the grand company, where he 
could not possibly know that she was come, and she should 
not see him for a long, long while, — not till after dinner, 
when they said he was to come up and make a speech. 

But Hetty was wrong in part of her conjecture. No 
grand company was come except the Irwines, for whom the 
carriage had been sent early; and Arthur was at that mo- 
ment not in a back room, but walking with the Rector into 
the broad stone cloisters of the old abbey, where the long 
tables were laid for all the cottage tenants and the farm- 
servants. A very handsome young Briton he looked to-day, 
in high spirits and a bright-blue frock-coat, the highest 
mode, — his arm no longer in a sling. So open-looking and 
candid, too ; but candid people have their secrets, and secrets 
leave no lines in young faces. 

“ Upon my word,” he said, as they entered the cool 
cloisters, “ I think the cottagers have the best of it ; these 
cloisters make a delightful dining-room on a hot day. That 
was capital advice of yours, Irwine, about the dinners, — 
to let them be as orderly and comfortable as possible, and 
only for the tenants, especially as I had only a limited sum 
after all ; for though my grandfather talked of a carte 
blanche, he could n’t make up his mind to trust me, when it 
came to the point.” 


258 


GOING TO THE BIRTHDAY FEAST 


“ Never mind, you ’ll give more pleasure in this quiet 
way,’’ said Mr. Irwine. “ In this sort of thing people are 
constantly confounding liberality with riot and disorder. It 
sounds very grand to say that so many sheep and oxen 
were roasted whole, and everybody ate who liked to come; 
but in the end it generally happens that no one has had an 
enjoyable meal. If the people get a good dinner and a mod- 
erate quantity of ale in the middle of the day, they ’ll be 
able to enjoy the games as the day cools. You can’t hinder 
some of them from getting too much towards evening ; but 
drunkenness and darkness go better together than drunken- 
ness and daylight.” 

“ Well, I hope there won’t be much of it. I ’ve kept the 
Treddleston people away, by having a feast for them in the 
town ; and I ’ve got Casson and Adam Bede, and some 
other good fellows, to look to the giving out of ale in the 
booths, and to take care things don’t go too far. Come, let 
us go up above now, and see the dinner-tables for the large 
tenants.” 

They went up the stone staircase leading simply to the 
long gallery above the cloisters, a gallery where all the 
dusty, worthless old pictures had been banished for the last 
three generations, — mouldy portraits of Queen Elizabeth 
and her ladies. General Monk with his eye knocked out, 
Daniel very much in the dark among the lions, and Julius 
Caesar on horseback, with a high nose and laurel crown, 
holding his Commentaries in his hand. 

“ What a capital thing it is that they saved this piece of 
the old abbey ! ” said Arthur. “ If I ’m ever master here, I 
shall do up the gallery in first-rate style; we’ve got no 
room in the house a third as large as this. That second 
table is for the farmers’ wives and children : Mrs. Best s^id 
it would be more comfortable for the mothers and children 
to be by themselves. I was determined to have the chil- 
dren, and make a regular family thing of it. I shall be ‘ the 
old squire’ to those little lads and lasses some day, and 
they’ll tell their children what a much finer young fellow 
I was than my own son. There ’s a table for the women and 
children below as well. But you will see them all, — you 
will come up with me after dinner, I hope ? ” 

259 


ADAM BEDE 


“Yes, to be sure,” said Mr. Irwine. “I wouldn’t miss 
your maiden speech to the tenantry.” 

“ And there will be something else you ’ll like to hear,” 
said Arthur. “ Let us go into the library and I ’ll tell you 
all about it, while my grandfather is in the drawing-room 
with the ladies. Something that will surprise you,” he con- 
tinued, as they sat down. “ My grandfather has come round, 
after all.” 

“ What, about Adam ? ” 

“Yes; I should have ridden over to tell you about it, 
only I was so busy. You know I told you I had quite given 
up arguing the matter with him, — I thought it was hope- 
less ; but yesterday morning he asked me to come in here to 
him before I went out, and astonished me by saying that he 
had decided on all the new arrangements he should make in 
consequence of old Satchell being obliged to lay by work, 
and that he intended to employ Adam in superintending the 
woods at a salary of a guinea a week, and the use of a pony 
to be kept here. I believe the secret of it is, he saw from the 
first it would be a profitable plan, but he had some particu- 
lar dislike of Adam to get over; and besides, the fact that 
I propose a thing is generally a reason with him for rejecting 
it. There ’s the most curious contradiction in my grand- 
father : I know he means to leave me all the money he has 
saved, and he is likely enough to have cut off poor Aunt 
Lydia, who has been a slave to him all her life, with only five 
hundred a year, for the sake of giving me all the more ; and 
yet I sometimes think he positively hates me because I ’m 
his heir. I believe if I were to break my neck, he would feel 
it the greatest misfortune that could befall him, and yet it 
seems a pleasure to him to make my life a series of petty 
annoyances.” 

“ Ah, my boy, it is not only woman’s love that is aTziptoTo^ 
€p(Ds, I as old ^schylus calls it. There ’s plenty of ‘ un- 
loving love ’ in the world of a masculine kind. But tell 
me about Adam. Has he accepted the post? I don’t see 
that it can be much more profitable than his present work, 
though, to be sure, it will leave him a good deal of time on 
his own hands.” 


260 


GOING TO THE BIRTHDAY FEAST 


“ Well, I felt some doubt about it when I spoke to him, 
and he seemed to hesitate at first. His objection was that 
he thought he should not be able to satisfy my grandfather. 
But I begged him as a personal favour to me not to let any 
reason prevent him from accepting the place, if he really 
liked the employment, and would not be giving up anything 
that was more profitable to him. And he assured me he 
should like it of all things ; it would be a great step forward 
for him in business, and it would enable him to do what he 
had long wished to do, — to give up working for Burge. 
He says he shall have plenty of time to superintend a little 
business of his own, which he and Seth will carry on, and 
will perhaps be able to enlarge by degrees. So he has agreed 
at last, and I have arranged that he shall dine with the large 
tenants to-day; and I mean to announce the appointment 
to them, and ask them to drink Adam’s health. It ’s a little 
drama I *ve got up in honour of my friend Adam. He ’s a 
fine fellow, and I like the opportunity of letting people know 
that I think so.” 

“ A drama in which friend Arthur piques himself on hav- 
ing a pretty part to play,” said Mr. Irwine, smiling. But 
when he saw Arthur colour, he went on relentingly : “ My 
part, you know, is always that of the old Fogy who sees 
nothing to admire in the young folks. I don’t like to admit 
that I ’m proud of my pupil when he does graceful things. 
But I must play the amiable old gentleman for once, and 
second your toast in honour of Adam. Has your grand- 
father yielded on the other point too, and agreed to have a 
respectable man as steward ? ” 

“ Oh, no,” said Arthur, rising: from his chair with an air 
of impatience, and walking along the room with his hands 
in his pockets. “ He ’s got some project or other about let- 
ting the Chase Farm, and bargaining for a supply of milk 
and butter for the house. But I ask no questions about it, 
— it makes me too angry. I believe he means to do all the 
business himself, and have nothing in the shape of a steward. 
It ’s amazing what energy he has, though.” 

“Well, we’ll go to the ladies now,” said Mr. Irwine, ris- 
ing too. “ I want to tell my mother what a splendid throne 
you ’ve prepared for her under the marquee.” 

261 


ADAM BEDE 


^‘Yes, and we must be going to luncheon too,” said Ar- 
thur. It must be two o’clock, , for there is the gong be- 
ginning to sound for the tenants’ dinners.” 


CHAPTER’ XXIII. 

DINNER-TIME. 

W lffiN Adam heard that he was to dine upstairs with 
the large tenants, he felt rather uncomfortable at the 
idea of being exalted in this way above his mother and Seth, 
who were to dine in the cloisters below. But Mr. Mills, the 
butler, assured him that Captain Donnithorne had given 
pai:^icular orders about it, and would be very angry if Adam 
was not there. 

Adam nodded, and went up to Seth, who was standing a 
few yards off. Seth, lad,” he said, “ the Captain has sent 
to say I ’m to dine upstairs, — he wishes it particular, Mr. 
Mills says, so I suppose it ’ud be behaving ill for me not to 
go. But I don’t like sitting up above thee and mother, as if 
I was better than my own flesh and blood. Thee ’t not take 
it unkind, I hope ? ” 

Nay, nay, lad,” said Seth, “thy honour’s our honour; 
and if thee get’st respect, thee ’st won it by thy own deserts. 
The further I see thee above me the better, so long as thee 
feel’st like a brother to me. It ’s because o’ thy being ap- 
pointed over the woods, and it ’s nothing but what ’s right. 
That ’s a place o’ trust, and thee ’t above a common work- 
man now.” 

“ Ay,” said Adam ; “ but nobody knows a word about it 
yet. I have n’t given notice to Mr. Burge about leaving 
him, and I don’t like to tell anybody else about it before he 
knows, for he ’ll be a good bit hurt, I doubt. People ’ull 
be wondering to see me there, and they ’ll like enough be 
guessing the reason, and asking questions, for there ’s been 
so much talk up and down about my having the place, this 
last three weeks.” 

“ Well, thee canst say thee wast ordered to come without 
262 


DINNER-TIME 


being told the reason. That ’s the truth. And mother ’ull 
be fine and joyful about it. Let ’s go and tell her.’’ 

Adam was not the only guest invited to come upstairs on 
other grounds than the amount he contributed to the rent- 
roll. There were other people in the two parishes who de- 
rived dignity from their functions rather than from their 
pocket, and of these Bartle Massey was one. His lame walk 
was rather slower than usual on this warm day, so Adam 
lingered behind when the bell rang for dinner, that he might 
walk up with his old friend; for he was a little too shy to 
join the Poyser party on this public occasion. Opportuni- 
ties of getting to Hetty’s side would be sure to turn up in 
the course of the day, and Adam contented himself with that, 
for he disliked any risk of being ‘‘ joked ” about Hetty ; the 
big, out-spoken, fearless man was very shy and diffident as 
to his love-making. 

Well, Mester Massey,” said Adam, as Bartle came up, 

I ’m going to dine upstairs with you to-day ; the Captain ’s 
sent me orders.” 

Ah ! ” said Bartle, pausing, with one hand on his back. 

Then there ’s something in the wind, — there ’s something 
in the wind. Have you heard anything about what the old 
Squire means to do? ” 

Why, yes,” said Adam ; “ I ’ll tell you what I know, 
because I believe you can keep a still tongue in your head 
if you like, and I hope you ’ll not let drop a word till it ’s 
common talk, for I ’ve particular reasons against its being 
known.” 

“ Trust to me, my boy, trust to me. I ’ve got no wife to 
worm it out of me and then run out and cackle it in every- 
body’s hearing. If you trust a man, let him be a bachelor, 
— let him be a bachelor.” 

“ Well, then, it was so far settled yesterday, that I ’m to 
take the management o’ the woods. The Captain sent for 
me t’ offer it me, when I was seeing to the poles and things 
here, and I ’ve agreed to ’t. But if anybody asks any ques- 
tions upstairs, just you take no no-tice, and turn the talk to 
something else, and I ’ll be obliged to you. Now let us go 
on, for we ’re pretty nigh the last, I think.” 

I know what to do, never fear,” said Bartle, moving om 

263 


ADAM BEDE 


The news will be good sauce to my dinner. Ay, ay, my 
boy, you ’ll get on. I ’ll back you for an eye at measuring, 
and a head-piece for figures, against any man in this county ; 
and you ’ve had good teaching, — you ’ve had good teach- 
ing.” 

When they got upstairs, the question which Arthur had 
left unsettled, as to who was to be president, and who vice, 
was still under discussion, so that Adam’s entrance passed 
without remark. 

“ It stands to sense,” Mr. Casson was saying, “ as old Mr. 
Poyser, as is th’ oldest man i’ the room, should sit at top o’ 
the table. I was n’t butler fifteen year without learning the 
rights and the wrongs about dinner.” 

“ Nay, nay,” said old Martin, I ’n gi’en up to my son; 
I ’m no tenant now : let my son take my place. Th’ ould 
foulks ha’ had their turn; they mun make way for the 
young uns.” 

“ I should ha’ thought the biggest tenant had the best 
right, more nor th’ oldest,” said Luke Britton, who was not 
fond of the critical Mr. Poyser ; “ there ’s Mester Holds- 
worth has more land nor anybody else on th’ estate.” 

Well,” said Mr. Poyser, “ suppose we say the man wi’ 
the foulest land shall sit at top ; then whoever gets th’ hon- 
our, there ’ll be no envying on him.” 

“ Eh, here ’s Mester Massey,” said Mr. Craig, who, being 
a neutral in the dispute, had no interest but in conciliation ; 

the schoolmaster ought to be able to tell you what ’s right. 
Who ’s to sit at top o’ the table, Mr. Massey? ” 

'' Why, the broadest man,” said Bartle ; “ and then he 
won’t take up other folks’ room ; and the next broadest 
must sit at bottom.” 

This happy mode of settling the dispute produced much 
laughter, — a smaller joke would have sufficed for that. Mr. 
Casson, however, did not feel it compatible with his dignity 
and superior knowledge to join in the laugh, until it turned 
out that he was fixed on as the second broadest man. Mar- 
tin Poyser the younger, as the broadest, was to be president, 
and Mr. Casson, as next broadest, was to be vice. 

Owing to this arrangement, Adam, being of course at 
the bottom of the table, fell under the immediate observa- 

264 


DINNER-TIME 


tion of Mr. Casson, who, too much occupied with the ques- 
tion of precedence, had not hitherto noticed his entrance. 
Mr. Casson, we have seen, considered Adam “ rather lifted 
up and peppery-like ; ” he thought the gentry made more 
fuss about this young carpenter than was necessary; they 
made no fuss about Mr. Casson, although he had been an 
excellent butler for fifteen years. 

Well, Mr. Bede, you ’re one o’ them as mounts hup’ards 
apace,” he said, when Adam sat down. “ You ’ve niver 
dined here before, as I remember.” 

“ No, Mr. Casson,” said Adam, in his strong voice, that 
could be heard along the table ; “ I ’ve never dined here 
before, but I come by Captain Donnithorne’s wish, and I 
hope it ’s not disagreeable to anybody here.” 

Nay, nay,” said several voices at once, “ we ’re glad 
ye ’re come. Who ’s got anything to say again’ it ? ” 

“ And ye ’ll sing us ‘ Over the hills and far away,’ after 
dinner, wonna ye ? ” said Mr. Chowne. That ’s a song I ’m 
uncommon fond on.” 

Peeh ! ” said Mr. Craig ; it ’s not to be named by side 
o’ the Scotch tunes. I ’ve never cared about singing my- 
self ; I ’ve had something better to do. A man that ’s got 
the names and the natur o’ plants in ’s head isna likely to 
keep a hollow place t’ hold tunes in. But a second cousin o’ 
mine, a drovier, was a rare hand at remembering the Scotch 
tunes. He ’d got nothing else to think on.” 

“ The Scotch tunes ! ” said Bartle Massey, contemptu- 
ously ; “ I ’ve heard enough o’ the Scotch tunes to last me 
while I live. They ’re fit for nothing but to frighten the 
birds with, — that ’s to say, the English birds, for the Scotch 
birds may sing Scotch for what I know. Give the lads a 
bagpipes instead of a rattle, and I ’ll answer for it the 
corn ’ll be safe.” 

Yes, there ’s folks as find a pleasure in undervallying 
what they know but little about,” said Mr. Craig. 

Why, the Scotch tunes are just like a scolding, nagging 
woman,” Bartle went on, without deigning to notice Mr. 
Craig’s remark. “ They go on with the same thing over and 
over again, and never come to a reasonable end. Anybody 
’ud think the Scotch tunes had always been asking a ques- 

265 


ADAM BEDE 


tion of somebody as deaf as old Taft, and had never got an 
answer yet” 

Adam minded the less about sitting by Mr. Casson, be- 
cause this position enabled him to see Hetty, who was not 
far off him at the next table. Hetty, however, had not 
even noticed his presence yet, for she was giving angry at- 
tention to Totty, who insisted on drawing up her feet on 
to the bench in antique fashion, and thereby threatened to 
make dusty marks on Hetty’s pink-and-white frock. No 
sooner were the little fat legs pushed down than up they 
came again, for Totty’s eyes were too busy in staring at the 
large dishes to see where the plum-pudding was, for her to 
retain any consciousness of her legs. Hetty got quite out 
of patience, and at last, with a frown and pout, and gather- 
ing tears, she said, — 

“ Oh, dear aunt, I wish you ’d speak to Totty ; she keeps 
putting her legs up so, and messing my frock.” 

“ What ’s the matter wi’ the child ? She can niver please 
you,” said the mother. “ Let her come by the side o’ me, 
then ; I can put up wi’ her.” 

Adam was looking at Hetty, and saw the frown and pout, 
and the dark eyes seeming to grow larger with pettish, half- 
gathered tears. Quiet Mary Burge, who sat near enough to 
see that Hetty was cross, and that Adam’s eyes were fixed 
on her, thought that so sensible a man as Adam must be 
reflecting on the small value of beauty in a woman whose 
temper was bad. Mary was a good girl, not given to in- 
dulge in evil feelings; but she said to herself that since 
Hetty had a bad temper, it was better Adam should know it. 
And it was quite true that if Hetty had been plain she 
would have looked very ugly and unamiable at that mo- 
ment, and no one’s moral judgment upon her would have 
been in the least beguiled. But really there was something 
quite charming in her pettishness, — it looked so much more 
like innocent distress than ill-humour ; and the severe Adam 
felt no movement of disapprobation ; he only felt a sort of 
amused pity, as if he had seen a kitten setting up its back, 
or a little bird with its feathers ruffled. He could not gather 
what was vexing her, but it was impossible to him to feel 
otherwise than that she was the prettiest thing in the world, 

266 


THE HEALTH-DRINKING 


and that if he could have his way, nothing should ever vex 
her any more. And presently, when Totty was gone, she 
caught his eye, and her face broke into one of its brightest 
smiles, as she nodded to him. It was a bit of flirtation, — 
she knew Mary Burge was looking at them; but the smile 
was like wine to Adam. 


CHAPTER XXIV. 

THE HEALTH-DRINKING. 

W HEN the dinner was over, and the first draughts from 
the great cask of birthday ale were brought up, 
room was made for the broad Mr. Poyser at the side of the 
table, and two chairs were placed at the head. It had been 
settled very definitely what Mr. Poyser was to do when the 
young Squire should appear; and for the last five minutes 
he had been in a state of abstraction, with his eyes fixed on 
the dark picture opposite, and his hands busy with the loose 
cash and other articles in his breeches-pockets. 

When the young Squire entered, with Mr. Irwine by his 
side, every one stood up; and this moment of homage was 
very agreeable to Arthur. He liked to feel fiis own im- 
portance, and besides that, he cared a great deal for the 
good-will of these people; he was fond of thinking that 
they had a hearty special regard for him. The pleasure he 
felt was in his face as he said, — 

My grandfather and I hope all our friends here have 
enjoyed their dinner, and find my birthday ale good. Mr. 
Irwine and I are come to taste it with you, and I am sure 
we shall all like anything the better that the Rector shares 
with us.'' 

All eyes were now turned on Mr. Poyser, who, with his 
hands still busy in his pockets, began with the deliberateness 
of a slow striking clock : “ Captain, my neighbours have 

put it upo' me to speak for 'em to-day; for where folks 
think pretty much alike, one spokesman 's as good as a 
score. And though we 've may-happen got contrairy ways 
o' thinking about a many things, — one man lays down 

267 


ADAM BEDE 


his land one way, an’ another another, an’ I ’ll not take 
it upon me to speak to no man’s farming but my own, — 
this I ’ll say, as we ’re all o’ one mind about our young 
Squire. We ’ve pretty nigh all on us known you when you 
war a little un, an’ we ’ve niver known anything on you but 
what was good an’ honourable. You speak fair an’ y’ act 
fair, an’ we ’re joyful when we look forrard to your being our 
landlord ; for we b’lieve you mean to do right by everybody, 
an’ ’ull make no man’s bread bitter to him if you can help it. 
That ’s what I mean, an’ that ’s what we all mean ; and 
when a man ’s said what he means, he ’d better stop, for th’ 
ale ’ull be none the better for stannin’. An’ I ’ll not say how 
we like th’ ale yet, for we couldna well taste it till we ’d 
drunk your health in it ; but the dinner was good, an’ if 
there ’s anybody hasna enjoyed it, it must be the fault of his 
own inside. An’ as for the Rector’s company, it ’s well 
known as that ’s welcome t’ all the parish wherever he may 
be ; an’ I hope, an’ we all hope, as he ’ll live to see us old 
folks, an’ our children grown to men an’ women, an’ your 
honour a family man. I ’ve no more to say as concerns the 
present time an’ so we ’ll drink our young Squire’s health, 
— three times three.” 

Hereupon a glorious shouting, a rapping, a jingling, a 
clattering, and a shouting, with plentiful da capo, pleasanter 
than a strain of sublimest music in the ears that receive such 
a tribute for the first time. Arthur had felt a twinge of 
conscience during Mr. Poyser’s speech, but it was too feeble 
to nullify the pleasure he felt in being praised. Did he not 
deserve what was said of him, on the whole? If there was 
something in his conduct that Poyser would n’t have liked 
if he had known it, why, no man’s conduct will bear too close 
an inspection; and Poyser was not likely to know it; and, 
after all, what had he done? Gone a little too far, per- 
haps, in flirtation, but another man in his place would have 
acted much worse ; and no harm would come, — no harm 
should come, for the next time he was alone with Hetty, he 
would explain to her that she must not think seriously of 
him or of what had passed. It was necessary to Arthur, 
you perceive, to be satisfied with himself: uncomfortable 
thoughts must be got rid of by good intentions for the 

268 


THE HEALTH-DRINKING 


future, which can be formed so rapidly that he had time 
to be uncomfortable and to become easy again before Mr. 
Poyser’s slow speech was finished; and when it was time 
for him to speak he was quite light-hearted. 

I thank you all, my good friends and neighbours,^' Ar- 
thur said, “ for the good opinion of me, and the kind feel- 
ings towards me which Mr. Poyser has been expressing on 
your behalf and on his own, and it will always be my hearti- 
est wish to deserve them. In the course of things we may 
expect* that, if I live, I shall one day or other be your land- 
lord ; indeed it is on the ground of that expectation that my 
grandfather has wished me to celebrate this day and to come 
among you now ; and I look forward to this position, not 
merely as one of power and pleasure for myself, but as a 
means of benefiting my neighbours. It hardly becomes so 
young a man as I am, to talk much about farming to you, 
who are most of you so much older, and are men of expe- 
rience ; still I have interested myself a good deal in such 
matters, and learned as much about them as my opportuni- 
ties have allowed ; and when the course of events shall place 
the estate in my hands, it will be my first desire to afford my 
tenants all the encouragement a landlord can give them, in 
improving their land, and trying to bring about a better 
practice of husbandry. It will be my wish to be looked on 
by all my deserving tenants as their best friend ; and noth- 
ing would make me so happy as to be able to respect every 
man on the estate, and to be respected by him in return. 
It is not my place at present to enter into particulars; I 
only meet your good hopes concerning me by telling you 
that my own hopes correspond to them, — that what you 
expect from me I desire to fulfil ; and I am quite of Mr. 
Poyser's opinion, that when a man has said what he means, 
he had better stop. But the pleasure I feel in having my 
own health drunk by you would not be perfect if we did not 
drink the health of my grandfather, who has filled the place 
of both parents to me. I will say no more, until you have 
joined me in drinking his health on a day when he has 
wished me to appear among you as the future representative 
of his name and family." 

Perhaps there was no one present except Mr. Irwine who 
269 


ADAM BEDE 


thoroughly understood and approved Arthur’s graceful 
mode of proposing his grandfather’s health. The farmers 
thought the young Squire knew well enough that they hated 
the old Squire, and Mrs. Poyser said, “ He ’d better not ha’ 
stirred a kettle o’ sour broth.” The bucolic mind does not 
readily apprehend the refinements of good taste. But the 
toast could not be rejected; and when it had been drunk, 
Arthur said, — 

‘‘ I thank you, both for my grandfather and myself ; and 
now there is one more thing I wish to tell you, that you 
may share my pleasure about it, as I hope and believe you 
will. I think there can be no man here who has not a re- 
spect, and some of you, I am sure, have a very high regard, 
for my friend Adam Bede. It is well known to every one in 
this neighbourhood that there is no man whose word can 
be more depended on than his ; that whatever he undertakes 
to do, he does well, and is as careful for the interests of those 
who employ him as for his own. I ’m proud to say that I 
was very fond of Adam when I was a little boy, and I have 
never lost my old feeling for him, — I think that shows that 
I know a good fellow when I find him. It has long been 
my wish that he should have the management of the woods 
on the estate, which happen to be very valuable; not only 
because I think so highly of his character, but because he 
has the knowledge and the skill which fit him for the place. 
And I am happy to tell you that it is my grandfather’s wish 
too, and it is now settled that Adam shall manage the woods, 
— a change which I am sure wdll be very much for the ad- 
vantage of the estate; and I hope you will by and by join 
me in drinking his health, and in wishing him all the pros- 
perity in life that he deserves. But there is a still older 
friend of mine than Adam Bede present, and I need not tell 
you that it is Mr. Irwine. I ’m sure you will agree with me 
that we musit drink no other person’s health until we have 
drunk his. I know you have all reason to love, him ; but no 
one of his parishioners has so much reason as I. Come, 
charge your glasses, and let us drink to our excellent Rec- 
tor, — three times three ! ” 

This toast was drunk with all the enthusiasm that was 
wanting to the last, and it certainly was the most picturesque 

270 


THE HEALTH-DRINKING 


moment ih the scene when Mr. Irwine got up to speak, and 
all the faces in the room were turned towards him. The 
superior refinement of his face was much more striking than 
that of Arthur’s when seen in comparison with the people 
round them. Arthur’s was a much commoner British face, 
and the splendour of his new-fashioned clothes was more 
akin to the young farmer’s taste in costume than Mr. Ir- 
wine’s powder, and the well-brushed but well-worn black, 
which seemed to be his chosen suit for great occasions ; for 
he had the mysterious secret of never wearing a new-look- 
ing coat. 

“ This is not the first time, by a great many,” he said, 
“ that I have had to thank my parishioners for giving me 
tokens of their good-will ; but neighbourly kindness is 
among those things that are the more precious the older 
they get. Indeed, our pleasant meeting to-day is a proof 
that when what is good comes of age and is likely to live, 
there is reason for rejoicing; and the relation between us as 
clergyman and parishioners came of age two years ago, for 
it is three-and-twenty years since I first came among you, 
and I see some tall fine-looking young men here, as well 
as some blooming young women, that were far from looking 
as pleasantly at me when I christened them as I am happy 
to see them looking now. But I ’m sure you will not won- 
der when I say that among all those young men, the 
one in whom I have the strongest interest is my friend 
Mr. Arthur Donnithorne, for whom you have just expressed 
your regard. I had the pleasure of being his tutor for sev- 
eral years, and have naturally had opportunities of knowing 
him intimately which cannot have occurred to any one else 
v^ho is present; and I have some pride as well as pleasure 
in assuring you that I share your high hopes concerning 
him, and your confidence in his possession of those qualities 
which will make him an excellent landlord when the time 
shall come for him to take that important position among 
you. We feel alike on most matters on which a man who 
is getting towards fifty can feel in common with a young 
man of one-and-twenty, and he has just been expressing a 
feeling which I share very heartily, and I would not willing- 
ly omit the opportunity of saying so. That feeling is his 

271 


ADAM BEDE 


value and respect for Adam Bede. People in a high station 
are of course more thought of and talked about, and have 
their virtues more praised, than those whose lives are passed 
in humble every-day work ; but every sensible man knows 
how necessary that humble every-day work is, and how im- 
portant it is to us that it should be done well. And I agree 
with my friend Mr. Arthur Donnithorne in feeling that when 
a man whose duty lies in that sort of work shows a char- 
acter which would make him an example in any station, his 
m.erit should be acknowledged. He is one of those to whom 
honour isMue, and his friends should delight to honour him. 
I know Adam Bede well, — I know what he is as a work- 
man, and what he has been as a son and brother, — and I 
am saying the simplest truth when I say that I respect him 
as much as I respect any man living. But I am not speak- 
ing to you about a stranger; some of you are his intimate 
friends, and I believe there is not one here who does not 
know enough of him to join heartily in drinking his health.” 

As Mr. Irwine paused, Arthur jumped up, and filling his 
glass, said, A bumper to Adam Bede, and may he live to 
have sons as faithful and clever as himself! ” 

No hearer, not even Bartle Massey, was so delighted with 
this toast as Mr. Poyser. Tough work ” as his first speech 
had been, he would have started up to make another if he 
had not known the extreme irregularity of such a course. 
As it was, he found an outlet for his feeling in drinking his 
ale unusually fast, and setting down his glass with a swing 
of his arm and a determined rap. If Jonathan Burge and a 
few others felt less comfortable on the occasion, they tried 
their best to look contented, and so the toast was drunk 
with a good-will apparently unanimous. 

Adam was rather paler than usual when he got up to 
thank his friends. He was a good deal moved by this public 
tribute, — very naturally, for he was in the presence of all 
his little world, and it was uniting to do him honour. But 
he felt no shyness about speaking, not being troubled with 
small vanity or lack of words; he looked neither awkward 
nor embarrassed, but stood in his usual firm upright atti- 
tude, with his head thrown a little backward and his hands 
perfectly still, in that rough dignity which is peculiar to 

272 


THE HEALTH-DRINKING 


intelligent, honest, well-built workmen, who are never won- 
dering what is their business in the world. 

I ’m quite taken by surprise,” he said. “ I did n’t ex- 
pect anything o’ this sort, for it ’s a good deal more than 
my wages. But I Ve the more reason to be grateful to you. 
Captain, and to you, Mr. Irwine, and to all my friends here, 
who ’ve drunk my health and wished me well. It ’ud be 
nonsense for me to be saying I don’t at all deserve th’ opin- 
ion you have of me ; that ’ud be poor thanks to you, to say 
that you ’ve known me all these years, and yet have n’t 
sense enough to find out a great deal o’ the truth about me. 
You think, if I undertake to do a bit o’ work, I ’ll do it 
well, be my pay big or little, — and that ’s true. I ’d be 
ashamed to stand before you here if it wasna true. But it 
seems to me that ’s a man’s plain duty, and nothing to be 
conceited about, and it ’s pretty clear to me as I ’ve never 
done more than my duty ; for let us do what we will, it ’s 
only making use o’ the sperrit and the powers that ha’ been 
given to us. And so this kindness o’ yours, I ’m sure, is no 
debt you owe me, but a free gift ; and as such I accept it 
and am thankful. And as to this new employment I ’ve 
taken in hand, I ’ll only say that I took it at Captain Donni- 
thorne’s desire, and that I ’ll try to fulfil his expectations. 
I ’d wish for no better lot than to work under him, and to 
know that while I was getting my own bread I was taking 
care of his int’rests. P'or I believe he ’s one o’ those gentle- 
men as wishes to do the right thing, and to leave the world 
a bit better than he found it ; which it ’s my belief every 
man may do, whether he ’s gentle or simple, whether he sets 
a good bit o’ work going and finds the money, or whether 
he does the work with his own hands. There ’s no occasion 
for me to say any more about what I feel towards him : I 
hope to show it through the rest o’ my life in my actions.” 

There were various opinions about Adam’s speech : some 
of the women whispered that he did n’t show himself thank- 
ful enough, and seemed to speak as proud as could be ; but 
most of the men were of opinion that nobody could speak 
more straightfor’ard, and that Adam was as fine a chap as 
need to be. While such observations were being buzzed 


ADAM BEDE 


about, mingled with wonderings as to what the old Squire 
meant to do for a bailiff, and whether he was going to have 
a steward, the two gentlemen had risen, and were walking 
round to the table where the wives and children sat. There 
was none of the strong ale here, of course, but wine and 
dessert, — sparkling gooseberry for the young ones, and 
some good sherry for the mothers. Mrs. Poyser was at the 
head of this table, and Totty was now seated in her lap, 
bending her small nose deep down into a wine-glass in 
search of the nuts floating there. 

“ How do you do, Mrs. Poyser? ” said Arthur. Were n't 
you pleased to hear your husband make such a good speech 
to-day ? " 

Oh, sir, the men are mostly so tongue-tied, — you 're 
forced partly to guess what they mean, as you do wi' the 
dumb creaturs." 

“ What ! you think you could have made it better for 
him?" said Mr. Irwine, laughing. 

“ Well, sir, when I want to say anything, I can mostly 
find words to say it in, thank God. Not as I 'm a-finding 
fau't wi' my husband ; for if he 's a man o' few words, what 
he says he 'll stand to." 

“ I 'm sure I never saw a prettier party than this," Ar- 
thur said, looking round at the apple-cheeked children. 
‘‘ My aunt and the Miss Irwines will come up and see you 
presently. They were afraid of the noise of the toasts, but 
it would be a shame for them not to see you at table." 

He walked on, speaking to the mothers and patting the 
children, while Mr. Irwine satisfied himself with standing 
still, and nodding at a distance, that no one's attention might 
be disturbed from the young Squire, the hero of the day. 
Arthur did not venture to stop near Hetty, but merely 
bowed to her as he passed along the opposite side. The 
foolish child felt her heart swelling with discontent; for 
what woman was ever satisfied with apparent neglect, even 
when she knows it to be the mask of love ? Hetty thought 
this was going to be the most miserable day she had had 
for a long while; a moment of chill daylight and reality 
came across her dream. Arthur, who had seemed so near 


274 


THE GAMES 


to her only a few hours before, was separated from her, as 
the hero of a great procession is separated from a small 
outsider in the crowd. 


CHAPTER XXV. 


THE GAMES. 



HE great dance was not to begin until eight o’clock; 


X but for any lads and lasses who liked to dance on 
the shady grass before then, there was music always at hand ; 
for was not the band of the Benefit Club capable of playing 
excellent jigs, reels, and horn-pipes? And, besides this, 
there was a grand band hired from Rosseter, who, with 
their wonderful wind-instruments and puffed-out cheeks, 
were themselves a delightful show to the small boys and 
girls ; to say nothing of Joshua Rann’s fiddle, which by an 
act of generous forethought he had provided himself with, 
in case any one should be of sufficiently pure taste to prefer 
dancing to a solo on that instrument. 

Meantime, when the sun had moved off the great open 
space in front of the house, the games began. There were 
of course well-soaped poles to be climbed by the boys and 
youths, races to be run by the old women, races to be run 
in sacks, heavy weights to be lifted by the strong men, and 
a long list of challenges to such ambitious attempts as that 
of walking as many yards as possible on one leg, — feats in 
which it was generally remarked that Wiry Ben, being “ the 
lissom’st, springest fellow i’ the country,” was sure to be 
pre-eminent. To crown all, there was to be a donkey-race, 
— that sublimest of all races, conducted on the grand so- 
cialistic idea of everybody encouraging everybody else’s 
donkey, and the sorriest donkey winning. 

And soon after four o’clock splendid old Mrs. Irwine, in 
her damask satin and jewels and black lace, was led out 
by Arthur, followed by the whole family party, to her raised 
seat under the striped marquee, where she was to give out 
the prizes to the victors. Staid, formal Miss Lydia had re- 
quested to resign that queenly office to the royal old lady. 


275 


ADAM BEDE 


and Arthur was pleased with this opportunity of gratifying 
his godmother’s taste for stateliness. Old Mr. Donnithorne, 
the delicately clean, finely scented, withered old man, led out 
Miss Irwine, with his air of punctilious, acid politeness ; Mr. 
Gawaine brought Miss Lydia, looking neutral and stiff in 
an elegant peach-blossom silk ; and Mr. Irwine came last 
with his pale sister Anne. No other friend of the family, 
besides Mr. Gawaine, was invited to-day; there was to be 
a grand dinner for the neighbouring gentry on the morrow, 
but to-day all the forces were required for the entertain- 
ment of the tenants. 

There was a sunk fence in front of the marquee, dividing 
the lawn from the park; but a temporary bridge had been 
made for the passage of the victors, and the groups of peo- 
ple standing, or seated here and there on benches, stretched 
on each side of the open space from the white marquees up 
to the sunk fence. 

Upon my word, it ’s a pretty sight,” said the old lady, 
in her deep voice, when she was seated, and looked round 
on the bright scene with its dark-green background ; “ and 
it ’s the last fete-day I ’m likely to see, unless you make 
haste and get married, Arthur. But take care you get a 
charming bride, else I would rather die without seeing her.” 

“ You ’re so terribly fastidious, godmother,” said Arthur, 

I ’m afraid I should never satisfy you with my choice.” 

“Well, I won’t forgive you if she’s not handsome. I 
can’t be put off with amiability, which is always the excuse 
people are making for the existence of plain people. And 
she must not be silly ; that will never do, because you ’ll 
want managing, and a silly woman can’t manage you. Who 
is that tall young man, Dauphin, with the mild face ? There, 
standing without his hat, and taking such care of that tall 
old woman by the side of him, — his mother of course. I 
like to see that.” 

“ What, don’t you know him, mother ? ” said Mr. Irwine. 
“ That is Seth Bede, Adam’s brother, — a Methodist, but a 
very good fellow. Poor Seth has looked rather down- 
hearted of late. I thought it was because of his father’s 
dying in that sad way ; but Joshua Rann tells me he wanted 

276 


THE GAMES 


to marry that sweet little Methodist preacher who was here 
about a month ago, and I suppose she refused him” 

Ah, I remember hearing about her ; but there are no 
end of people here that I don’t know, for they ’re grown up 
and altered so since I used to go about.” 

“ What excellent sight you have ! ” said old Mr. Donni- 
thorne, who was holding a double glass up to his eyes, “ to 
see the expression of that young man’s face so far off. His 
face is nothing but a pale, blurred spot to me. But I fancy 
I have the advantage of you when we come to look close. 
I can read small print without spectacles.” 

“ Ah, my dear sir, you began with being very near-sight- 
ed, and those near-sighted eyes always wear the best. I 
want very strong spectacles to read with, but then I think 
my eyes get better and better for things at a distance. I 
suppose if I could live another fifty years, I should be blind 
to everything that was n’t dht of other people’s sight, like a 
man who stands in a well, and sees nothing but the stars.” 

“ See,” said Arthur, the old women are ready to set out 
on their race now. Which do you bet on, Gawaine ? ” 

“ The long-legged one, unless they ’re going to have sev- 
eral heats, and then the little wiry one may win.” 

There are the Poysers, mother, not far off on the right 
hand,” said Miss Irwine. Mrs. Poyser is looking at you. 
Do take notice of her.” 

“ To be sure I will,” said the old lady, giving a gracious 
bow to Mrs. Poyser. “ A woman who sends me such ex- 
cellent cream-cheese is not to be neglected. Bless me ! what 
a fat child that is she is holding on her knee! But who is 
that pretty girl with dark eyes ? ” 

“ That is Hetty Sorrel,” said Miss Lydia Donnithome, 
“ Martin Poyser’s niece, — a very likely young person, and 
well-looking too. My maid has taught her fine needlework, 
and she has mended some lace of mine very respectably in- 
deed, — very respectably.” 

“ Why, she has lived with the Poysers six or seven years, 
mother; you must have seen her,” said Miss Irwine. 

“No, I ’ve never seen her, child ; at least not as she is 
now,” said Mrs. Irwine, continuing to look at Hetty, “Well- 
looking, indeed ! She ’s a perfect beauty ! I Ve never seen 

277 


ADAM BEDE 


anything so pretty since my young days. What a pity such 
beauty as that should be thrown away among the farmers, 
when it ’s wanted so terribly among the good families with- 
out fortune ! I dare say, now, she ’ll marry a man who 
would have thought her just as pretty if she had had round 
eyes and red hair.” 

Arthur dared not turn his eyes towards Hetty while Mrs. 
Irwine was speaking of her. He feigned not to hear, and 
to be occupied with something on the opposite side. But he 
saw her plainly enough without looking ; saw her in height- 
ened beauty, because he heard her beauty praised, — for 
other men’s opinion, you know, was like a native climate to 
Arthur’s feelings ; it was the air on which they thrived the 
best, and grew strong. Yes! she was enough to turn any 
man’s head, — any man in his place would have done and 
felt the same; and to give her up after all, as he was de- 
termined to do, would be an act that he should always look 
back upon with pride. 

“ No, mother,” said Mr. Irwine, replying to her last words; 
“ I can’t agree with you there. The common people are not 
quite so stupid as you imagine. The commonest man, who 
has his ounce of sense and feeling, is conscious of the differ- 
ence between a lovely, delicate woman, and a coarse one. 
Even a dog feels a difference in their presence. The man 
may be no better able than the dog to explain the influence 
the more refined beauty has on him, but he feels it.” 

Bless me, Dauphin, what does an old bachelor like you 
know about it ? ” 

Oh, that is one of the matters in which old bachelors are 
wiser than married men, because they have time for more 
general contemplation. Your fine critic of women must 
never shackle his judgment by calling one woman his own. 
But, as an example of what I was saying, that pretty Metho- 
dist preacher I mentioned just now, told me that she had 
preached to the roughest miners, and had never been treated 
with anything but the utmost respect and kindness by them. 
The reason is — though she does n’t know it — that there ’s 
so much tenderness, refinement, and purity about her. 
Such a woman as that brings with her ‘ airs from heaven ’ 
that the coarsest fellow is not insensible to.” 

278 


THE GAMES 


Here ’s a delicate bit of womanhood or girlhood, com- 
ing to receive a prize, I suppose,” said Mr. Gawaine. “ She 
must be one of the racers in the sacks, who had set off be- 
fore we came.” 

The “ bit of womanhood ” was our old acquaintance 
Bessy Cranage, otherwise Chad’s Bess, whose large red 
cheeks and blowsy person had undergone an exaggeration 
of colour, which, if she had happened to be a heavenly body, 
would have made her sublime. Bessy, I am sorry to say, 
had taken to her ear-rings again since Dinah’s departure, 
and was otherwise decked out in such small finery as she 
could muster. Any one who could have looked into poor 
Bessy’s heart would have seen "a striking resemblance be- 
tween her little hopes and anxieties and Hetty’s. The ad- 
vantage, perhaps, would have been on Bessy’s side in the 
matter of feeling. But then, you see, they were so very 
different outside! You would have been inclined to box 
Bessy’s ears, and you would have longed to kiss Hetty. 

Bessy had been tempted to run the arduous race, partly 
from mere hoidenish gayety, partly because of the prize. 
Some one had said there were to be cloaks and other nice 
clothes for prizes, and she approached the marquee, fan- 
ning herself with her handkerchief, but with exultation 
sparkling in her round eyes. 

“ Here is the prize for the first sack-race,” said Miss 
Lydia, taking a large parcel from the table where the prizes 
were laid, and giving it to Mrs. Irwine before Bessy came 
up ; “ an excellent grogram gown and a piece of flannel.” 

“ You did n’t think the winner was to be so young, I sup- 
pose, aunt ? ” said Arthur. Could n’t you find something 
else for this girl, and save that grim-looking gown for one 
of the older women? ” 

“ I have bought nothing but what is useful and sub- 
stantial,” said Miss Lydia, adjusting her own lace ; “ I 
should not think of encouraging a love of finery in young 
women of that class. I have a scarlet cloak, but that is for 
the old woman who wins.” 

This speech of Miss Lydia’s produced rather a mocking 
expression in Mrs. Irwine’s face as she looked at Arthur, 
while Bessy came up and dropped a series of courtesies. 

279 


ADAM BEDE 


This is Bessy Cranage, mother,” said Mr. Irwine, kindly, 
“ Chad Cranage’s daughter. You remember Chad Cran- 
age, the blacksmith ? ” 

“ Yes, to be sure,” said Mrs. Irwine. “ Well, Bessy, here 
is your prize, — excellent warm things for winter. I ’m 
sure you have had hard work to win them this warm day.” 

Bessy’s lip fell as she saw the ugly, heavy gown, — which 
felt so hot and disagreeable, too, on this July day, and was 
such a great, ugly thing to carry. She dropped her courte- 
sies again, without looking up, and with a growing tremu- 
lousness about the corners of her mouth, and then turned 
away. 

“ Poor girl,” said Arthur ; “ I think she ’s disappointed. 
I wish it had been something more to her taste.” 

“ She ’s a bold-looking young person,” observed Miss 
Lydia ; “ not at all one I should like to encourage.” 

Arthur silently resolved that he would make Bessy a pres- 
ent of money before the day was over, that she might buy 
something more to her mind ; but she, not aware of the 
consolation in store for her, turned out of the open space, 
where she was visible from the marquee, and throwing down 
the odious bundle under a tree, began to cry, — very much 
tittered at the while by the small boys. In this situation she 
was descried by her discreet matronly cousin, who lost no 
time in coming up, having just given the baby into her hus- 
band’s charge. 

What ’s the matter wi' ye? ” said Bess the matron, tak- 
ing up the bundle and examining it. “ Ye ’n sweltered 
yoursen, I reckon, running that fool’s race. An’ here, 
they ’n gi’en you lots o’ good grogram and flannel, as should 
ha’ been gi’en by good rights to them as had the sense to 
keep away from such foolery. Ye might spare me a bit o’ 
this grogram to make clothes for the lad, — ye war ne’er 
ill-natured, Bess ; I ne’er said that on ye.” 

“Ye may take it all, for what I care,” said Bess the 
maiden, with a pettish movement, beginning to wipe away 
her tears and recover herself. 

“ Well, I could do wi’ ’t, if so be ye want to get rid on ’t,” 
said the disinterested cousin, walking quickly away with the 
bundle, lest Chad’s Bess should change her mind. 

280 


THE GAMES 


But that bonny-cheeked lass was blessed with an elastic- 
ity of spirits that secured her from any rankling grief; and 
by the time the grand climax of the donkey-race came on, 
her disappointment was entirely lost in the delightful excite- 
ment of attempting to stimulate the last donkey by hisses, 
while the boys applied the argument of sticks. But the 
strength of the donkey mind lies in adopting a course in- 
versely as the arguments urged, which, well considered, re- 
quires as great a mental force as the direct sequence ; and 
the present donkey proved the first-rate order of his intelli- 
gence by coming -to a dead stand still just when the blows 
were thickest. Great was the shouting of the crowd, radiant 
the grinning of Bill Downes, the stone-sawyer and the fortu- 
nate rider of this superior beast, which stood calm and stiff- 
legged in the midst of its triumph. 

Arthur himself had provided the prizes for -the men ; and 
Bill was made happy with a splendid pocket-knife, supplied 
with blades and gimlets enough to make a man at home on a 
desert island. He had hardly returned from the marquee 
with the prize in his hand, when it began to be understood 
that Wiry Ben proposed to amuse the company, before the 
gentry went to dinner, with an impromptu and gratuitous 
performance, — namely, a hornpipe, the main idea of 
which was doubtless borrowed; but this was to be de- 
veloped by the dancer in so peculiar and complex a manner 
that no one could deny him the praise of originality. Wiry 
Beil’s pride in his dancing — an accomplishment productive 
of great effect at the yearly Wake — had needed only 
slightly elevating by an extra quantity of good ale, to con- 
vince him that the gentry would be very much struck with 
his performance of the hornpipe ; and he had been decidedly 
encouraged in this idea by Joshua Rann, who observed that 
it was nothing but right to do something to please the young 
Squire, in return for what he had done for them. You will 
be the less surprised at this opinion in so grave a personage 
when you learn that Ben had requested Mr. Rann to ac- 
company him on the fiddle ; and Joshua felt quite sure that 
though there might not be much in the dancing, the music 
would make up for it. Adam Bede, who was present in one 
of the large marquees, where the plan was being discussed, 

281 


ADAM BEDE 


told Ben he had better not make a fool of himself, — a re- 
mark which at once fixed Ben’s determination ; he was not 
going to let anything alone because Adam Bede turned up 
his nose at it. 

“ What ’s this, what ’s this ? ” said old Mr. Donnithorne. 

Is it something you ’ve arranged, Arthur ? Here ’s the 
clerk coming with his fiddle, and a smart fellow with a nose- 
gay in his button-hole.” 

“ No,” said Arthur; “ I know nothing about it. By Jove, 
he ’s going to dance ! It ’s one of the carpenters, — I forget 
his name at this moment.” 

“It’s Ben Cranage, — Wiry Ben, they call him,” said 
Mr. Irwine ; “ rather a loose fish, I think. Anne, my dear, 
I see that fiddle-scraping is too much for you ; you ’re get- 
ting tired. Let me take you in now, that you may rest till 
dinner.” 

Miss Anne rose assentingly, and the good brother took 
her away, while Joshua’s preliminary scraping burst into 
the “ White Cockade,” from which he intended to pass to a 
variety of tunes, by a series of transitions which his good 
ear really taught him to execute with some skill. It would 
have been an exasperating fact to him, if he had known it, 
that the general attention was too thoroughly absorbed by 
Ben’s dancing for any one to give much heed to the music. 

Have you ever seen a real English rustic perform a solo 
dance? Perhaps you have only seen a ballet rustic, smiling 
like a merry countryman in crockery, with graceful turns of 
the haunch and insinuating movements of the head. That 
is as much like the real thing as the “ Bird Waltz ” is like 
the song of birds. Wiry Ben never smiled; he looked as 
serious as a dancing monkey, — as serious as if he had been 
an experimental philosopher ascertaining in his own per- 
son the amount of shaking and the varieties of angularity 
that could be given to the human limbs. 

To make amends for the abundant laughter in the striped 
marquee, Arthur clapped his hands continually and cried, 
“ Bravo ! ” But Ben had one admirer whose eyes followed 
his movements with a fervid gravity that equalled his own. 
It was Martin Poyser, who was seated on a bench, with 
Tommy between his legs. 


282 


THE DANCE 


^‘What dost think that?” he said to his wife. He 
goes as pat to the music as if he was made o’ clockwork, i 
used to be a pretty good un at dancing myself when I was 
lighter, but I could niver ha’ hit it just to th’ hair like that.” 

“ It ’s little matter what his limbs are, to my thinking,” 
returned Mrs. Poyser. “ He ’s empty enough i’ the upper 
story, or he ’d niver come jigging an’ stamping i’ that way, 
like a mad grasshopper, for the gentry to look at him. 
They ’re fit to die wi’ laughing, I can see.” 

“ Well, well, so much the better, it amuses ’em,” said Mr. 
Poyser, who did not easily take an irritable view of things. 

But they ’re going away now, t’ have their dinner, I 
reckon. We’ll move about a bit, shall we? and see what 
Adam Bede ’s doing. He ’s got to look after the drinking 
and things; I doubt he hasna had much fun.” 


CHAPTER XXVI. 


THE DANCE 


RTHUR had chosen the entrance-hall for the ball- 



.XX room, — very wisely, for no other room could have 
been so airy, or would have had the advantage of the wide 
doors opening into the garden, as well as a ready entrance 
into the other rooms. To be sure, a stone floor was not the 
pleasantest to dance on; but then, most of the dancers 
had known what it was to enjoy a Christmas dance on 
kitchen quarries. It was one of those entrance-halls which 
make the surrounding rooms look like closets, — with 
stucco angels, trumpets, and flower-wreaths on the lofty 
ceiling, and great medallions of miscellaneous heroes on the 
walls, alternating with statues in niches. Just the sort of 
place to be ornamented well with green boughs, and Mr. 
Craig had been proud to show his taste and his hot-house 
plants on the occasion. The broad steps of the stone stair- 
case were covered with cushions to serve as seats for the 
chil(!fren, who were to stay till half-past nine with the serv- 
ant-maids to see the dancing; and as this dance was con- 
fined to the chief tenants, there was abundant room for 


283 


ADAM BEDE 


every one. The lights were charmingly disposed in col- 
oured-paper lamps, high up among green boughs; and the 
farmers’ wives and daughters, as they peeped in, believed no 
scene could be more splendid. They knew now quite well in 
what sort of rooms the king and queen lived ; and their 
thoughts glanced with some pity towards cousins and ac- 
quaintances who had not this fine opportunity of knowing 
how things went on in the great world. The lamps were 
already lit, though the sun had not long set, and there was 
that calm light out of doors in which we seem to see all ob- 
jects more distinctly than in the broad day. 

It was a pretty scene outside the house. The farmers and 
their families were moving about the lawn, among the flow- 
ers and shrubs, or along the broad straight road leading 
from the east front, where a carpet of mossy grass spread on 
each side, studded here and there with a dark flat-boughed 
cedar, or a grand pyramidal fir sweeping the ground with 
its branches, all tipped with a fringe of paler green. The 
groups of cottagers in the park were gradually diminishing ; 
the young ones being attracted towards the lights that were 
beginning to gleam from the windows of the gallery in the 
abbey, which was to be their dancing-room, and some of 
the sober elder ones thinking it time to go home quietly. 
One of these was Lisbeth Bede ; and Seth went with her, — 
not from filial attention only, for his conscience would not 
let him join in dancing. It had been a rather melancholy 
day to Seth. Dinah had never been more constantly pres- 
ent with him in this scene, where everything was so un- 
like her. He saw her all the more vividly after looking at 
the thoughtless faces and gay-coloured dresses of the young 
women, — just as one feels the beauty and the greatness of 
a pictured Madonna the more, when it has for a moment 
screened from us a vulgar head in a bonnet. But this pres- 
ence of Dinah in his mind only helped him to bear the bet- 
ter with his mother’s mood, which had been becoming more 
and more querulous for the last hour. Poor Lisbeth was 
suffering from a strange conflict of feelings. Her joy and 
pride in the honour paid to her darling son Adam was be- 
ginning to be worsted in the conflict with the jealousy and 
fretfulness which had revived when Adam came to tell her 

284 


THE DANCE 


that Captain Donnithorne desired him to join the dancers 
in the hall. Adam was getting more and more out of her 
reach ; she wished all the old troubles back again, for then 
it mattered more to Adam what his mother said and did. 

“ Eh, it ’s fine talkin' o’ dancin’,” she said, “an’ thy father 
not a five week in ’s grave. An’ I wish I war there too, istid 
o’ bein’ left to take up merrier folks’s room above ground.” 

“ Nay, don’t look at it i’ that way, mother,” said Adam, 
who was determined to be gentle to her to-day. “ I don’t 
mean to dance, — I shall only look on. And since the Cap- 
tain wishes me to be there, it ’ud look as if I thought I knew 
better than him to say as I ’d rather not stay. And thee 
know’st how he ’s behaved to me to-day.” 

“ Eh, thee ’t do as thee lik’st, for thy old mother ’s got no 
right t’ hinder thee. She ’s nought but th’ old husk, and 
thee ’st slipped away from her, like the ripe nut.” 

“ Well, mother,” said Adam, “I’ll go and tell the Captain 
as it hurts thy feelings for me to stay, and I ’d rather go 
home upo’ that account ; he won’t take it ill then, I dare say, 
and I ’m willing.” He said this with some effort, for he 
really longed to be near Hetty this evening. 

“ Nay, nay, I wonna ha’ thee do that, — the young Squire 
’ull be angered. Go an’ do what thee ’t ordered to do, an’ 
me and Seth ’ull go whome. I know it ’s a grit honour for 
thee to be so looked on, — an’ who ’s to be prouder on it 
nor thy mother? Hadna she the cumber o’ rearin’ thee, an’ 
doin’ for thee all these ’ears ? ” 

“ Well, good-by, then, mother, — good-by, lad, — re- 
member Gyp when you get home,” said Adam, turning 
away towards the gate of the pleasure-grounds, where he 
hoped he might be able to join the Poysers, for he had been 
so occupied throughout the afternoon that he had had no 
time to speak to Hetty. His eye soon detected a distant 
group, which he knew to be the right one, returning to the 
house along the broad gravel road ; and he hastened on to 
meet them. 

“ Why, Adam, I ’m glad to get sight on y’ again,” said 
Mr. Poyser, who was carrying Totty on his arm. “ You ’re 
going t’ have a bit o’ fun, I hope, now your work ’s all done. 
And here ’s Hetty has promised no end o’ partners, an’ I ’ve 

285 


ADAM BEDE 


just been askin’ her if she ’d agreed to dance wi’ you, an’ she 
says no.” 

“ Well, I did n’t think o’ dancing to-night,” said Adam, 
already tempted to change his mind, as he looked at Hetty. 

“ Nonsense ! ” said Mr. Poyser. Why, everybody ’s 
goin’ to dance to-night, all but th’ old Squire and Mrs. Ir- 
wine. Mrs. Best ’s been tellin’ us as Miss Lyddy and Miss 
Irwine ’ull dance, an’ the young Squire ’ull pick my wife for 
his first partner, t’ open the ball ; so she ’ll be forced to 
dance, though she ’s laid by ever sin’ the Christmas afore the 
little un was born. You canna for shame stand still, Adam, 
an’ you a fine young fellow, and can dance as well as anv- 
body.” 

“ Nay, nay,” said Mrs. Poyser, “ it ’ud be unbecomin’. I 
know the dancin’ ’s nonsense ; but if you stick at everything 
because it ’s nonsense, you wonna go far i’ this life. When 
your broth ’s ready-made for you, you mun swallow the 
thickenin’, or else let the broth alone.” 

“ Then if Hetty ’ull dance with me,” said Adam, yielding 
either to Mrs. Poyser’s argument or to something else, I ’ll 
dance whichever dance she ’s free.” 

I ’ve got no partner for the fourth dance,” said Pletty ; 
** I ’ll dance that with you, if you like.” 

“ Ah,” said Mr. Poyser, but you mun dance the first 
dance, Adam, else it ’ll look partic’ler. There ’s plenty o’ 
nice partners to pick an’ choose from, an’ it ’s hard for the 
gells when the men stan’ by and don’t ask ’em.” 

Adam felt the justice of Mr. Poyser’s observation. It 
would not do for him to dance with no one besides Hetty ; 
and remembering that Jonathan Burge had some reason to 
feel hurt to-day, he resolved to ask Miss Mary to dance with 
him the first dance, if she had no other partner. 

“ There ’s the big clock strikin’ eight,” said Mr. Poyser ; 

we must make haste in now, else the Squire and the ladies 
’ull be in afore us, an’ that wouldna look well.” 

When they had entered the hall, and the three children 
under Molly’s charge had been seated on the stairs, the 
folding-doors of the drawing-room were thrown open, and 
Arthur entered in his regimentals, leading Mrs. Irwine to a 
carpet-covered dais ornamented with hot-house plants, 

286 


THE DANCE 


where she and Miss Anne were to be seated with old Mr. 
Donnithorne, that they might look on at the dancing, like 
the kings and queens in the plays. Arthur had put on his 
uniform to please the tenants, he said, who thought as much 
of his militia dignity as if it had been an elevation to the 
premiership. He had not the least objection to gratify them 
in that way; his uniform was very advantageous to his 
figure. 

The old Squire, before sitting down, walked round the 
hall to greet the tenants and make polite speeches to the 
wives. He was always polite; but the farmers had found 
out, after long puzzling, that this polish was one of the 
signs of hardnesss. It was observed that he gave his most 
elaborate civility to Mrs. Poyser to-night, inquiring partic- 
ularly about her health, recommending her to strengthen 
herself with cold water as he did, and avoid all drugs. Mrs. 
Poyser courtesied and thanked him with great self-com- 
mand, but when he had passed on she whispered to her 
husband, “ I ’ll lay my life he ’s brewin’ some nasty turn 
against us. Old Harry doesna wag his tail so for nothin’.’’ 

Mr. Poyser had no time to answer, for now Arthur came 
up and said, “ Mrs. Poyser, I ’m come to request the favour 
of your hand for the first dance ; and Mr. Poyser, you must 
let me take you to my aunt, for she claims you as her part- 
ner.” 

The wife’s pale cheek flushed with a nervous sense of 
unwonted honour as Arthur led her to the top of the room ; 
but Mr. Poyser, to whom an extra glass had restored his 
youthful confidence in his good looks and good dancing, 
walked along with them quite proudly, secretly flattering 
himself that Miss Lydia had never had a partner in her life 
who could lift her of¥ the ground as he would. In order to 
balance the honours given to the two parishes. Miss Irwine 
danced with Luke Britton, the largest Broxton farmer, and 
Mr. Gawaine led out Mrs. Britton. Mr. Irwine, after seat- 
ing his sister Anne, had gone to the abbey gallery, as he had 
agreed with Arthur beforehand, to see how the merriment 
of the cottagers was prospering. Meanwhile all the less dis- 
tinguished couples had taken their places. Hetty was led 
out by the inevitable Mr. Craig, and Mary Burge by Adam ; 

287 


ADAM BEDE 


and now the music struck up, and the glorious country- 
dance, best of all dances, began. 

Pity it was not a boarded floor! Then the rhythmic 
stamping of the thick shoes would have been better than 
any drums. That merry stamping, that gracious nodding 
of the head, that waving bestowal of the hand, — where can 
we see them now? That simple dancing of well-covered 
matrons, laying aside for an hour the cares of house and 
dairy, remembering but not affecting youth, not jealous but 
proud of the young maidens by their side, — that holiday 
sprightliness of portly husbands paying little compliments 
to their wives, as if their courting days were come again, — 
those lads and lasses a little confused and awkward with 
their partners, having nothing to say, — it would be a pleas- 
ant variety to see all that sometimes, instead of low dresses 
and large skirts, and scanning glances exploring costumes, 
and languid men in lackered boots smiling with double 
meaning. 

There was but one thing to mar Martin Poyser’s pleasure 
in this dance: it was that he was always in close contact 
with Luke Britton, that slovenly farmer. He thought of 
throwing a little glazed coldness into his eye in the crossing 
of his hands ; but then, as Miss Irwine was opposite to him 
instead of the offensive Luke, he might freeze the wrong 
person; so he gave his face up to hilarity, unchilled by 
moral judgments. 

How Hetty’s heart beat as Arthur approached her! He 
had hardly looked at her to-day ; now he must take her 
hand. Would he press it? would he look at her? She 
thought she would cry if he gave n6 sign of feeling. Now 
he was there, — he had taken her hand, — yes, he was press- 
ing it. Hetty turned pale as she looked up at him for an 
instant and met his eyes, before the dance carried him away. 
That pale look came upon Arthur like the beginning of a 
dull pain, which clung to him, though he must dance and 
smile and joke all the same. Hetty would look so, when he 
told her what he had to tell her ; and he should never be able 
to bear it, — he should be a fool and give way again. Hetty’s 
look did not really mean so much as he thought ; it was only 
the sign of a struggle between the desire for him to^ notice 

288 


THE DANCE 


her, and the dread lest she should betray the desire to oth- 
ers. But Hetty’s face had a language that transcended her 
feelings. There are faces which Nature charges with a 
meaning and pathos not belonging to the single human soul 
that flutters beneath them, but speaking the joys and sor- 
rows of foregone generations, — eyes that tell of deep love 
which doubtless has been and is somewhere, but not paired 
with these eyes, — perhaps paired with pale eyes that can say 
nothing; just as a national language may be instinct with 
poetry unfelt by the lips that use it. That look of Hetty’s 
oppressed Arthur with a dread which yet had something of 
a terrible unconfessed delight in it, that she loved him too 
well. There was a hard task before him, for at that moment 
he felt he would have given up three years of his youth for 
the happiness of abandoning himself without remorse to his 
passion for Hetty. 

These were the incongruous thoughts in his mind as he 
led Mrs. Poyser, who was panting with fatigue, and se- 
cretly resolving that neither judge nor jury should force 
her to dance another dance, to take a quiet rest in the din- 
ing-room, where supper was laid out for the guests to come 
and take it as they chose. 

“ I ’ve desired Hetty to remember as she ’s got to dance 
wi’ you, sir,” said the good, innocent woman ; “ for she ’s so 
thoughtless, she ’d be like enough to go an’ engage herself 
for ivery dance ; so I told her not to promise too many.” 

“ Thank you, Mrs. Poyser,” said Arthur, not without a 
twinge. “ Now sit down in this comfortable chair, and 
here is Mills ready to give you what you would like best.” 

He hurried away to seek another matronly partner, for 
due honour must be paid to the married women before he 
asked any of the young ones ; and the country-dances, and 
the stamping, and the gracious nodding, and the waving of 
the hands went on joyously. 

At last the time had come for the fourth dance, — longed 
for by the strong, grave Adam, as if he had been a delicate- 
handed youth of eighteen ; for we are all very much alike 
when we are in our first love; and Adam had hardly ever 
touched Hetty’s hand for more than a transient greeting, — 
had never danced with her but once before. His eyes had 

289 


19 


ADAM BEDE 


followed her eagerly to-night in spite of himself, and had 
taken in deeper draughts of love. He thought she behaved 
so prettily, so quietly ; she did not seem to be flirting at all, 
she smiled less than usual ; there was almost a sweet sadness 
about her. “ God bless her ! ” he said inwardly ; “ I ’d make 
her life a happy un, if a strong arm to work for her, and a 
heart to love her, could do it.” 

And then there stole over him delicious thoughts of com- 
ing home from work, and drawing Hetty to his side, and 
feeling her cheek softly pressed against his, till he forgot 
where he was, and the music and the tread of feet might 
have been the falling of rain and the roaring of the wind, 
for what he knew. 

But now the third dance was ended, and he might go up 
to her and claim her hand. She was at the far end of the 
hall near the staircase, whispering with Molly, who had just 
given the sleeping Totty into her arms, before running to 
fetch shawls and bonnets from the landing. Mrs. Poyser 
had taken the two boys away into the dining-room to give 
them some cake before they went home in the cart with 
grandfather, and Molly was to follow as fast as possible. 

Let me hold her,” said Adam, as Molly turned upstairs ; 
“ the children are so heavy when they Ve asleep.” 

Hetty was glad of the relief ; for to hold Totty in her 
arms, standing, was not at all a pleasant variety to her. But 
this second transfer had the unfortunate effect of rousing 
Totty, who was not behind any child of her age in peevish- 
ness at an unseasonable awaking. While Hetty was in the 
act of placing her in Adam’s arms, and had not yet with- 
drawn her own, Totty opened her eyes, and forthwith 
fought out with her left fist at Adam’s arm, and with her 
right caught at the string of brown beads round Hetty’s 
neck. The locket leaped out from her frock, and the next 
moment the string was broken, and Hetty, helpless, saw 
beads and locket scattered wide on the floor. 

“ My locket, my locket ! ” she said, in a loud, frightened 
whisper to Adam ; never mind the beads.” 

Adam had already seen where the locket fell, for it had 
attracted his glance as it leaped out of her frock. It had 
fallen on the raised wooden dais where the band sat, not on 


290 


THE DANCE 


the stone floor ; and as Adam picked it up, he saw the glass 
with the dark and light locks of hair under it. It had fallen 
that side upwards, so the glass was not broken. He turned 
it over on his hand, and saw the enamelled gold back. 

It is n’t hurt,” he said ; as he held it towards Hetty, who 
v/as unable to take it because both her hands were occupied 
with Totty. 

“ Oh, it does n’t matter. I don’t mind about it,” said 
Hetty, who had been pale and was now red. 

“ Not matter?” said Adam, gravely. “ You seemed very 
frightened about it. I ’ll hold it till you ’re ready to take it,” 
he added, quietly closing his hand over it, that she might 
not think he wanted to look at it again. 

By this time Molly had come with bonnet and shawl ; and 
as soon as she had taken Totty, Adam placed the locket in 
Hetty’s hand. She took it with an air of indifference, and 
put it in her pocket ; in her heart vexed and angry with 
Adam, because he had seen it, but determined now that she 
would show no more signs of agitation. 

See,” she said, “ they ’re taking their places to dance ; 
let us go.” 

Adam assented silently. A puzzled alarm had taken pos- 
session of him. Had Hetty a lover he didn’t know of? — 
for none of her relations, he was sure, would give her a 
locket like that ; and none of her admirers, with whom he 
was acquainted, was in the position of an accepted lover, as 
the giver of that locket must be. Adam was lost in the 
utter impossibility of finding any person for his fears to 
alight on : he could only feel with a terrible pang that there 
was something in Hetty’s life unknown to him ; that while 
he had been rocking himself in the hope that she would 
come to love him, she was already loving another. The 
pleasure of the dance with Hetty was gone; his eyes, when 
they rested on her, had an uneasy questioning expression in 
them ; he could think of nothing to say to her ; and she, too, 
was out of temper and disinclined to speak. They were both 
glad when the dance was ended. 

Adam was determined to stay no longer ; no one wanted 
him, and no one would notice if he slipped away. As soon 
as he got out of doors, he began to walk at his habitual 

291 


ADAM BEDE 


rapid pace, hurrying along without knowing why, busy with 
the painful thought that the memory of this day, so full of 
honour and promise to him, was poisoned forever. Sud- 
denly, when he was far on through the Chase, he stopped, 
startled by a flash of reviving hope. After all, he might be 
a fool, making a great misery out of a trifle. Hetty, fond of 
finery as she was, might have bought the thing herself. It 
looked too expensive for that, — it looked like the things 
on white satin in the great jeweller’s shop at Rosseter. But 
Adam had very imperfect notions of the value of such 
things, and he thought it could certainly not cost more than 
a guinea. Perhaps Hetty had had as much as that in 
Christmas boxes, and there was no knowing but she might 
have been childish enough to spend it in that way ; she was 
such a young thing, and she could n’t help loving finery ! 
But then, why had she been so frightened about it at first, 
and changed colour so, and afterwards pretended not to 
care? Oh, that was because she was ashamed of his seeing 
that she had such a smart thing, — she was conscious that 
it was wrong for her to spend her money on it, and she knew 
that Adam disapproved of finery. It was a proof she cared 
about what he liked and disliked. She must have thought 
from his silence and gravity afterwards that he was very 
much displeased with her, that he was inclined to be harsh 
and severe towards, her foibles. And as he walked on more 
quietly, chewing the cud of this new hope, his only uneasi- 
ness was that he had behaved in a way which might chill 
Hetty’s feelings towards him. For this last view of the 
matter must be the true one. How could Hetty have an 
accepted lover, quite unknown to him? She was never 
away from her uncle s house for more than a day ; she could 
have no acquaintances that did not come there, and no in- 
timacies unknown to her uncle and aunt. It would be folly 
to believe that the locket was given to her by a lover. The 
little ring of dark hair he felt sure was her own ; he could 
form no guess about the light hair under it, for he had not 
seen it very distinctly. It might be a bit of her father’s or 
mother’s, who had died when she was a child, and she 
would naturally put a bit of her own along with it. 

And so Adam went to bed comforted, having woven for 

292 


THE DANCE 


himself an ingenious web of probabilities, — the surest 
screen a wise man can place between himself and the truth. 
His last waking thoughts melted into a dream that he was 
\vith Hetty again at the Hall Farm, and that he was asking 
her to forgive him for being so cold and silent. 

And while he was dreaming this, Arthur was leading 
Hetty to the dance, and saying to her in low hurried tones, 

I shall be in the wood the day after to-morrow at seven ; 
come as early as you can.” And Hetty's foolish joys and 
hopes, which had flown away for a little space, scared by a 
mere nothing, now all came fluttering back, unconscious of 
the real peril. She was happy for the first time this long 
day, and wished that dance would last for hours. Arthur 
wished it too ; it was the last weakness he meant to indulge 
in ; and a man never lies with more delicious languor under 
the influence of a passion, than when he has persuaded him- 
self that he shall subdue it to-morrow. 

But Mrs. Poyser’s wishes were quite the reverse of this, 
for her mind was filled with dreary forebodings as to the 
retardation of to-morrow morning’s cheese in consequence 
of these late hours. Now that Hetty had done her duty and 
danced one dance with the young Squire, Mr. Poyser must 
go out and see if the cart was come back to fetch them, for 
it was half-past ten o’clock ; and notwithstanding a mild 
suggestion on his part that it would be bad manners for 
them to be the first to go, Mrs. Poyser was resolute on the 
point, “ manners or no manners.” 

“ What ! going already, Mrs. Poyser ? ” said old Mr. Don- 
nithorne, as she came to courtesy and take leave ; T 
thought we should not part with any of our guests till 
eleven. Mrs. Irwine and I, who are elderly people, think of 
sitting out the dance till then.” 

Oh, your honour, it ’s all right and proper for gentle- 
folks to stay up by candle light, — they ’ve got no cheese on 
their minds. We ’re late enough as it is, an’ there ’s no 
lettin’ the cows know as they must n’t want to be milked so 
early to-morrow mornin’. So, if you ’ll please t’ excuse us, 
we ’ll take our leave.” 

“ Eh ! ” she said to her husband, as they set off in the 
cart, “ I ’d sooner ha’ brewin’ day and washin’ day together 


293 


ADAM BEDE 


than one o’ these pleasurin’ days. There ’s no work so tirin’ 
as danglin’ about an’ starin’ an’ not rightly knowin’ what 
you ’re goin’ to do next ; and keepin’ your face i’ smilin’ 
order like a grocer o’ market-day for fear people shouldna 
think you civil enough. An’ you ’ve nothing to show for ’t 
when it ’s done, if it is n’t a yallow face wi’ eatin’ things as 
disagree.” 

Nay, nay,” said Mr. Poyser, who was in his merriest 
mood, and felt that he had had a great day, a bit o’ pleas- 
uring ’s good for thee sometimes. An’ thee danc’st as well 
as any of ’em, for I ’ll back thee against all the wives i’ the 
parish for a light foot an’ ankle. An’ it was a great honour 
for the young Squire to ask thee first, — I reckon it was be- 
cause I sat at th’ head o’ the table an’ made the speech. 
An’ Hetty too, — she never had such a partner before, — a 
fine young gentleman in reg’mentals. It ’ll serve you to 
talk on, Hetty, when you ’re an old woman, — how you 
danced wi’ th’ young Squire the day he come o’ age.” 


294 


BOOK IV. 


CHAPTER XXVII. 

A CRISIS. 

I T was beyond the middle of August, — nearly three weeks 
after the birthday feast. The reaping of the wheat had 
begun in our north midland county of Loamshire, but the 
harvest was likely still to be retarded by the heavy rains, 
which were causing inundations and much damage through- 
out the country. From this last trouble the Broxton and 
Hayslope farmers, on their pleasant uplands and in their 
brook-watered valleys, had not suffered; and as I cannot 
pretend that they were such exceptional farmers as to love 
the general good better than their own, you will infer that 
they were not m very low spirits about the rapid rise in the 
price of bread, so long as there was hope of gathering in 
their own corn undamaged; and occasional days of sun- 
shine and drying winds flattered this hope. 

The i8th of August was one of these days, when the sun- 
shine looked brighter in all eVes for the gloom that went 
before. Grand masses of cloud were buried across the blue, 
and the great round hills behind the Chase seemed alive 
with their flying shadows ; the sun was hidden for a moment, 
and then shone out warm again like a recovered joy; the 
leaves, still green, were tossed off the hedgerow trees by 
the wind ; around the farmhouses there was a sound of 
clapping doors ; the apples fell in the orchards ; and the 
stray horses on the green sides of the lanes and on the 
Common had their manes blown about their faces. And 
yet the wind seemed only part of the general gladness be- 
cause the sun was shining. A merry day for the children, 
who ran and shouted to see if they could top the wind with 
their voices; and the grown-up people, too, were in good 

295 


ADAM BEDE 


.s, inclined to believe in yet finer days, when the wind 
^d fallen. If only the corn were not ripe enough to be 
blown out of the husk and scattered as untimely seed ! 

And yet a day on which a blighting sorrow may fall upon 
a man. For if it be true that Nature at certain moments 
seems charged with a presentiment of one individual lot, 
must it not also be true that she seems unmindful, uncon- 
scious of another? For there is no hour that has not its 
births of gladness and despair, no morning brightness that 
does not bring new sickness to desolation as well as new 
forces to genius and love. There are so many of us, and 
our lots are so different: what wonder that Nature’s mood 
is often in harsh contrast with the great crisis of our lives? 
We are children of a large family, and must learn, as such 
children do, not to expect that|our hurts will be made much 
of, — to be content with little nurture and caressing, and 
help each other the more. 

It was a busy day with Adam, who of late had done al- 
most double work ; for he was continuing to act as foreman 
for Jonathan Burge, until some satisfactory person could be 
found to supply his place, and Jonathan was slow to find 
that person. But he had done the extra work cheerfully, for 
his hopes were buoyant again about Hetty. Every time she 
had seen him since the birthday, she had seemed to make an 
effort to behave all the more kindly to him, that she might 
make him understand she had forgiven his silence and cold- 
ness during the dance. He had never mentioned the locket 
to her again ; too happy that she smiled at him, — still 
happier because he observed in her a more subdued air, 
something that he interpreted as the growth of womanly 
tenderness and seriousness. “ Ah ! ” he thought again and 
again, “ she ’s only seventeen ; she ’ll be thoughtful enough 
after a while. And her aunt allays says how clever she is at 
the work. She ’ll make a wife as mother ’ll have no occa- 
sion to grumble at, after all.” To be sure, he had only seen 
her at home twice since the birthday ; for one Sunday, when 
he was intending to go from church to the Hall Farm, 
Hetty had joined the party of upper servants from the Chase, 
and had gone home with them, — almost as if she were 
inclined to encourage Mr. Craig. She ’s takin’ too much 

296 


A CRISIS 


likin’ to them folks i’ the housekeeper’s room,” Mrs. Poyser 
remarked. “ For my part, I was never over-fond o’ gentle- 
folks’s servants, — they ’re mostly like the fine ladies’ fat 
dogs, nayther good for barking nor butcher’s meat, but on’y 
for show.” And another evening she was gone to Treddles- 
ton to buy some things ; though, to his great surprise, as 
he was returning home, he saw her at a distance getting 
over a stile quite out of the Treddleston road. But when 
he hastened to her, she was very kind, and asked him to go 
in again when he had taken her to the yard-gate. She had 
gone a little farther into the fields after coming from Tred- 
dleston, because she did n’t want to go in, she said ; it was 
so nice to be out of doors, and her aunt always made such 
a fuss about it if she wanted to go out. “ Oh, do come in 
with me ! ” she said, as he wa? going to shake hands with 
her at the gate ; and he could not resist that. So he went in, 
and Mrs. Poyser was contented with only a slight remark on 
Hetty’s being later than was expected; while Hetty, who 
had looked out of spirits when he met her, smiled and 
talked, and waited on them all with unusual promptitude. 

That was the last time he had seen her ; but he meant to 
make leisure for going to the Farm to-morrow. To-day, he 
knew, was her day for going to the Chase to sew with the 
lady’s-maid ; so he would get as much work done as pos- 
sible this evening, that the next might be clear. 

One piece of work that Adam was superintending was 
some slight repairs at the Chase Farm, which had been 
hitherto occupied by Satchell, as bailiff, but which it was 
now rumoured that the old Squire was going to let to a 
smart man in topboots, who had been seen to ride over it 
one day. Nothing but the desire to get a tenant could 
account for the Squire’s undertaking repairs, though the 
Saturday-evening party at Mr. Casson’s agreed over their 
pipes that no man in his senses would take the Chase Farm 
unless there was a bit more ploughland laid to it. How- 
ever that might be, the repairs were ordered to be executed 
with all despatch ; and Adam, acting for Mr. Burge, was 
carrying out the order with his usual energy. But to-day, 
having been occupied elsewhere, he had not been able to 
arrive at the Chase Farm till late in the afternoon ; and he 

297 


ADAM BEDE 


then discovered that some old roofing, which he had cal- 
culated on preserving, had given way. There was clearly 
no good to be done with this part of the building without 
pulling it all down ; and Adam immediately saw in his mind 
a plan for building it up again, so as to make the most 
convenient of cow-sheds and calf-pens, with a hovel for im- 
plements; and all without any great expense for materials. 
So, when the workmen were gone, he sat down, took out 
his pocket-book, and busied himself with sketching a plan, 
and making a specification of the expenses, that he might 
show it to Burge the next morning, and set him on per- 
suading the Squire to consent. To “ make a good job ” of 
anything, however small, was always a pleasure to Adam; 
and he sat on a block, with his book resting on a planing- 
table, whistling low every now and then, and turning his 
head on one side with a just perceptible smile of gratifica- 
tion, — of pride, too, for if Adam loved a bit of good work, 
he loved also to think, “ I did it ! ” And I believe the only 
people who are free from that weakness are those who have 
no work to call their own. It was nearly seven before he 
had finished and put on his jacket again ; and on giving a 
last look round, he observed that Seth, who had been work- 
ing here to-day, had left his basket of tools behind him. 
'' Why, th’ lad 's forgot his tools,” thought Adam, “ and 
he ’s got to work up at the shop to-morrow. There never 
was such a chap for wool-gathering ; he ’d leave his head 
behind him, if it was loose. However, it ’s lucky I Ve seen 
’em ; I ’ll carry ’em home.” 

The buildings of the Chase Farm lay at one extremity 
of the Chase, at about ten minutes’ walking distance from 
the Abbey. Adam had come thither on his pony, intending 
to ride to the stables, and put up his nag on his way home. 
At the stables he encountered Mr. Craig, who had come to 
look at the Captain’s new horse, on which he was to ride 
away the day after to-morrow ; and Mr. Craig detained him 
to tell how all the servants were to collect at the gate of 
the courtyard to wish the young Squire luck as he rode out ; 
so that by the time Adam had got into the Chase, and was 
striding along with the basket of tools over his shoulder, 
the sun was on the point of setting, and was sending level 

298 


A CRISIS 


crimson rays among the great trunks of the old oaks, and 
touching every bare patch of ground with a transient glory, 
that made it look like a jewel dropt upon the grass. The 
wind had fallen now, and there was only enough breeze to 
stir the delicate-stemmed leaves. Any one who had been 
sitting in the house all day would have been glad to walk 
now; but Adam had been quite enough in the open air to 
wish to shorten his way home ; and he bethought himself 
that he might do so by striking across the Chase and going 
through the Grove, where he had never been for years. 
He hurried on across the Chase, stalking along the narrow 
paths between the fern, with Gyp at his heels, not lingering 
to watch the magnificent changes of the light, — hardly once 
thinking of it, — yet feeling its presence in a certain calm, 
happy awe which mingled itself with his busy working-day 
thoughts. How could he help feeling it ? The very deer felt 
it, and were more timid. 

Presently Adames thoughts recurred to what Mr. Craig 
had said about Arthur Donnithorne, and pictured his going 
away, and the changes that might take place before he came 
back; then they travelled back affectionately over the old 
scenes of boyish companionship, and dwelt on Arthur’s good 
qualities, which Adam had a pride in, as we all have in the 
virtues of the superior who honours us. A nature like 
Adam’s, with a great need of love and reverence in it, de- 
pends for so much of its happiness on what it can believe 
and feel about others! And he had no ideal world of dead 
heroes ; he knew little of the life of men in the past ; he must 
find the beings to whom he could cling with loving admira- 
tion among those who came within speech of him. These 
pleasant thoughts about Arthur brought a milder expres- 
sion than usual into his keen rough face ; perhaps they were 
the reason why, when he opened the old green gate lead- 
ing into the Grove, he paused to pat Gyp, and say a kind 
word to him. 

After that pause he strode on again along the broad 
winding path through the Grove. What grand beeches! 
Adam delighted in a fine tree, of all things ; as the fisher- 
man’s sight is keenest on the sea, so Adam’s perceptions 
were more at home with trees than with other objects. He 


299 


ADAM BEDE 


kept them in his memory, as a painter does, with all the 
flecks and knots in their bark, all the curves and angles of 
their boughs, and had often calculated the height and con- 
tents of a trunk to a nicety, as he stood looking at it. No 
wonder that, notwithstanding his desire to get on, he could 
not help pausing to look at a curious large beech which he 
had seen standing before him at a turning in the road, and 
convince himself that it was not two trees wedded together, 
but only one. For the rest of his life he remembered that 
moment when he was calmly examining the beech, as a 
man remembers his last glimpse of the home where his 
youth was passed, before the road turned, and he saw it no 
more. The beech stood at the last turning before the Grove 
ended in an archway of boughs that let in the eastern light ; 
and as Adam stepped away from the tree to continue his 
walk, his eyes fell on two figures about twenty yards be- 
fore him. 

He remained as motionless as a statue, and turned almost 
as pale. The two figures were standing opposite to each 
other, with clasped hands about to part; and while they 
were bending to kiss. Gyp, who had been running among 
the brushwood, came out, caught sight of them, and gave a 
sharp bark. They separated with a start, — one hurried 
through the gate out of the Grove, and the other, turning 
round, walked slowly, with a sort of saunter, towards Adam, 
who still stood transfixed and pale, clutching tighter the 
stick with which he held the basket of tools over his shoul- 
der, and looking at the approaching figure with eyes in 
which amazement was fast turning to fierceness. 

Arthur Donnithorne looked flushed and excited; he had 
tried to make unpleasant feelings more bearable by drinking 
a little more wine than usual at dinner to-day, and was still 
enough under its flattering influence to think more lightly 
of this unwished-for rencontre with Adam than he would 
otherwise have done. After all, Adam was the best person 
who could have happened to see him and Hetty together; 
he was a sensible fellow, and would not babble about it to 
other people. Arthur felt confident that he could laugh the 
thing off, and explain it away. And so he sauntered forward 
with elaborate carelessness, — his flushed face, his evening 

300 


A CRISIS 


dress of fine cloth and fine linen, his hands half thrust into 
his waistcoat pockets, all shone upon by the strange evening 
light which the light clouds had caught up even to the 
zenith, and were now shedding down between the topmost 
branches above him. 

Adam was still motionless, looking at him as he came up. 
He understood it all now, — the locket, and everything else 
that had been doubtful to him; a terrible scorching light 
showed him the hidden letters that changed the meaning of 
the past. If he had moved a muscle, he must inevitably 
have sprung upon Arthur like a tiger ; and in the conflicting 
emotions that filled those long moments, he had told himself 
that he would not give loose to passion, he would only speak 
the right thing. He stood as if petrified by an unseen force, 
but the force was his own strong will. 

“Well, Adam,’’ said Arthur, “you’ve been looking at 
the fine old beeches, eh ? They ’re not to be come near by 
the hatchet, though ; this is a sacred grove. I overtook 
pretty little Hetty Sorrel as I was coming to my den, — the 
Hermitage, there. She ought not to come home this way 
so late. So I took care of her to the gate, and asked for a 
kiss for my pains. But I must get back now, for this road is 
confoundedly damp. Good-night, Adam ; I shall see you 
to-morrow — to say good-by, you know.” 

Arthur was too much preoccupied with the part he was 
playing himself to be thoroughly aware of the expression 
in Adam’s face. He did not look directly at Adam, but 
glanced carelessly round at the trees, and then lifted up one 
foot to look at the sole of his boot. He cared to say no 
more ; he had thrown quite dust enough into honest Adam’s 
eyes ; and as he spoke the last works, he walked on. 

“ Stop a bit, sir ! ” said Adam, in a hard, peremptory 
voice, without turning round. “ I ’ve got a word to say to 
you.” 

Arthur paused in surprise. Susceptible persons are more 
affected by a change of tone than by unexpected words, and 
Arthur had the susceptibility of a nature at once affectionate 
and vain. He was still more surprised when he saw that 
Adam had not moved, but stood with his back to him, as if 
summoning him to return. What did he mean? He was 

301 


ADAM BEDE 


going to make a serious business of this affair. Arthur felt 
his temper rising. A patronizing disposition always has 
its meaner side, and in the confusion of his irritation and 
alarm there entered the feeling that a man to whom he had 
shown so much favour as to Adam was not in a position 
to criticise his conduct. And yet he was dominated, as one 
who feels himself in the wrong always is, by the man whose 
good opinion he cares for. In spite of pride and temper, 
there was as much deprecation as anger in his voice when 
he said, — 

What do you mean, Adam ? ” 

I mean, sir,’’ answered Adam, in the same harsh voice, 
still without turning round, — I mean, sir, that you don’t 
deceive me by your light words. This is not the first time 
you ’ve met Hetty Sorrel in this grove, and this is not the 
first time you ’ve kissed her.” 

Arthur felt a startled uncertainty how far Adam was 
speaking from knowledge, and how far from mere inference ; 
and this uncertainty, which prevented him from contriving 
a prudent answer, heightened his irritation. He said, in a 
high, sharp tone, — 

“Well, sir, what then?” 

“ Why, then, instead of acting like th’ upright, honour- 
able man we ’ve all believed you to be, you ’ve been acting 
the part of a selfish light-minded scoundrel. You know, as 
well as I do, what it ’s to lead to, when a gentleman like 
you kisses and makes love to a young woman like Hetty, 
and gives her presents as she ’s frightened for other folks 
to see. And I say it again, you ’re acting the part of a 
selfish light-minded scoundrel, though it cuts me to th’ 
heart to say so, and I ’d rather ha’ lost my right hand.” 

“ Let me tell you, Adam,” said Arthur, bridling his grow- 
ing anger, and trying to recur to his careless tone, “ you ’re 
not only devilishly impertinent, but you ’re talking nonsense. 
Every pretty girl is not such a fool as you, to suppose that 
when a gentleman admires her beauty and pays her a little 
attention, he must mean something particular. Every man 
likes to flirt with a pretty girl, and every pretty girl likes 
to be flirted with. The wider the distance between them, 

302 


A CRISIS 


the less harm there is, for then she ’s not likely to deceive 
herself.'" 

“ I don’t know what you mean by flirting,” said Adam ; 
“ but if you mean behaving to a woman as if you loved 
her, and yet not loving her all the while, I say that ’s not 
th’ action of an honest man, and what is n’t honest does 
come t’ harm. I ’m not a fool, and you ’re not a fool, and 
you know better than what you ’re saying. You know it 
could n’t be made public as you ’ve behaved to Hetty as y’ 
have done without her losing her character and bringing 
shame and trouble on her and her relations. What if you 
meant nothing by your kissing and your presents? Other 
folks won’t believe as you ’ve meant nothing ; and don’t tell 
me about her not deceiving herself. I tell you as you ’ve 
filled her mind so with the thought of you, as it ’ll mayhap 
poison her life ; and she ’ll never love another man as ’ud 
make her a good husband.” 

Arthur had felt a sudden relief while Adam was speaking ; 
he perceived that Adam had no positive knowledge of the 
past, and that there was no irrevocable damage done by 
this evening’s unfortunate rencontre. Adam could still be 
deceived. The candid Arthur had brought himself into a 
position in which successful lying was his only hope. The 
hope allayed his anger a little. 

“ Well, Adam,” he said, in a tone of friendly concession, 
‘‘ you ’re perhaps right. Perhaps I ’ve gone a little too far 
in taking notice of the pretty little thing, and stealing a 
kiss now and then. You ’re such a grave, steady fellow, you 
don’t understand the temptation to such trifling. I ’m sure 
I would n’t bring any trouble or annoyance on her and the 
good Poysers on any account if I could help it. But I 
think you look a little too seriously at it. You know I ’m 
going away immediately, so I sha’ n’t make any more mis- 
takes of the kind. But let us say good-night,” — Arthur 
here turned round to walk on, — “ and talk no mof e about 
the matter. The whole thing will soon be forgotten.” 

'' No, by God ! ” Adam burst out with rage that could be 
controlled no longer, throwing down the basket of tools, and 
striding forward till he was right in front of Arthur. All 
his jealousy and sense of personal injury, which he had been 

303 


ADAM BEDE 


hitherto trying to keep under, had leaped up and mastered 
him. What man of us, in the first moments of a sharp 
agony, could ever feel that the fellow-man who has been 
the medium of inflicting it did not mean to hurt us? In 
our instinctive rebellion against pain, we are children again, 
and demand an active will to wreak our vengeance on. 
Adam at this moment could only feel that he had been 
robbed of Hetty, — robbed treacherously by the man in 
whom he had trusted ; and he stood close in front of Arthur, 
with fierce eyes glaring at him, with pale lips and clenched 
hands, the hard tones in which he had hitherto been con- 
straining himself to express no more than a just indignation, 
giving way to a deep agitated voice that seemed to shake 
him as he spoke. 

“ No, it ’ll not be soon forgot as you Ve come in between 
her and me, when she might ha’ loved me, — it ’ll not soon 
be forgot as you ’ve robbed me o’ my happiness, while I 
thought you was my best friend, and a noble-minded man, 
as I was proud to work for. And you ’ve been kissing her 
and meaning nothing, have you? And I never kissed her i’ 
my life, — but I ’d ha’ worked hard for years for the right to 
kiss her. And you make light of it. You think little o’ 
doing what may damage other folks, so as you get your bit 
o’ trifling, as means nothing. I throw back your favours, 
for you ’re not the man I took you for. I ’ll never count you 
my friend any more. I ’d rather you ’d act as my enemy, 
and fight me where I stand, — it ’s all th’ amends you can 
make me.” 

Poor Adam, possessed by rage that could find no other 
vent, began to throw off his coat and his cap, too blind with 
passion to notice the change that had taken place in Ar- 
thur while he was speaking. Arthur’s lips were now as 
pale as Adam’s; his heart was beating violently. The dis- 
covery that Adam loved Hetty was a shock which made him 
for the moment see himself in the light of Adam’s indigna- 
tion, and regard Adam’s suffering as not merely a conse- 
quence, but an element of his error. The words of hatred 
and contempt — the first he had ever heard in his life — 
seemed like scorching missiles that were making inefface- 
able scars on him. All screening self-excuse, which rarely 

304 


A CRISIS 


falls quite away while others respect us, forsook him for an 
instant, and he stood face to face with the first great irrevo- 
cable evil he had ever committed. He was only twenty-one, 
and three months ago — nay, much later — he had thought 
proudly that no man should ever be able to reproach him 
justly. His first impulse, if there had been time for it, would 
perhaps have been to utter words of propitiation ; but Adam 
had no sooner thrown off his coat and cap, than he became 
aware that Arthur was standing pale and motionless, with 
his hands still thrust in his waistcoat pockets. 

'' What ! ” he said, " won't you fight me like a man? You 
know I won't strike you while you stand so." 

" Go away, Adam," said Arthur, “ I don't want to fight 
you." 

" No," said Adam, bitterly ; " you don't want to fight me, 
— you think I 'm a common man, as you can injure without 
answering for it." 

" I never meant to injure you," said Arthur, with return- 
ing anger. " I did n’t know you loved her.” 

" But you 've made her love you,” said Adam. " You 're 
a double-faced man, — I 'll never believe a word you say 
again." 

" Go away, I tell you,” said Arthur, angrily, " or we shall 
both repent." 

" No," said Adam, with a convulsed voice, " I swear I 
won't go away without fighting you. Do you want provok- 
ing any more ? I tell you you 're a coward and a scoundrel 
and I despise you.” 

The colour had all rushed back to Arthur's face; in a 
moment his right hand was clenched, and dealt a blow like 
lightning, which sent Adam staggering backward. His 
blood was as thoroughly up as Adam’s now; and the two 
men, forgetting the emotions that had gone before, fought 
with the instinctive fierceness of panthers in the deepening 
twilight darkened by the trees. The delicate-handed gen- 
tleman was a match for the workman in everything but 
strength ; and Arthur’s skill enabled him to protract the 
struggle for some long moments. But between unarmed 
men the battle is to the strong, where the strong is no 
blunderer ; and Arthur must sink under a well-planted blow 

305 


20 


ADAM BEDE 


of Adam’s, as a steel rod is broken by an iron bar. The 
blow soon came; and Arthur fell, his head lying concealed 
in a tuft of fern, so that Adam could only discern his darkly 
clad body. 

He stood still in the dim light, waiting for Arthur to rise. 

The blow had been given now, towards which he had 
been straining all the force of nerve and muscle, — and what 
was the good of it? What had he done by fighting? Only 
satisfied his own passion, only wreaked his own vengeance. 
He had not rescued Hetty, nor changed the past; there it 
was just as it had been, and he sickened at the vanity of his 
own rage. 

But why did not Arthur rise? He was perfectly motion- 
less, and the time seemed long to Adam. . . . Good God! 
had the blow been too much for him? Adam shuddered at 
the thought of his own strength, as with the oncoming of 
this dread he knelt down by Arthur’s side and lifted his 
head from among the fern. There was no sign of life : the 
eyes and teeth were set. The horror that rushed over Adam 
completely mastered him., and forced upon him its own 
belief. He could feel nothing but that death was in Ar- 
thur’s face, and that he was helpless before it. He made 
not a single movement, but knelt like an image of despair 
gazing at an image of death. 


CHAPTER XXVHI. 

A DILEMMA. 

I T was only a few minutes measured by the clock — 
though Adam always thought it had been a long while 
— before he perceived a gleam of consciousness in Arthur’s 
face and a slight shiver through his frame. The intense joy 
that flooded his soul brought back some of the old affection 
with it. 

“ Do you feel any pain, sir? ” he said tenderly, loosening 
Arthur’s cravat. 

Arthur turned his eyes on Adam with a vague stare which 
gave way to a slightly startled motion as if from the shock 

306 


A DILEMMA 


of returning memory. But he only shivered again and said 
nothing. 

‘‘ Do you feel any hurt, sir ? Adam said again, with a 
trembling in his voice. 

Arthur put his hand up to his waistcoat buttons, and 
when Adam had unbuttoned it, he took a longer breath. 
“ Lay my head down,” he said faintly, “ and get me some 
water if you can.” 

Adam laid the head down gently on the fern again, and 
emptying the tools out of the flag-basket, hurried through 
the trees to the edge of the Grove bordering on the Chase, 
where a brook ran below the bank. 

When he returned with his basket leaking, but still half 
full, Arthur looked at him with a more thoroughly re- 
awakened consciousness. 

Can you drink a drop out o’ your hand, sir?” said 
Adam, kneeling down again to lift up Arthur’s head. 

“ No,” said Arthur, “ dip my cravat in, and souse it on 
my head.” 

The water seemed to do him some good, for he presently 
raised himself a little higher, resting on Adam’s arm. 

Do you feel any hurt inside, sir ? ” Adam asked again. 

“ No, — no hurt,” said Arthur, still faintly, “ but rather 
done up.” 

After a while he said, “ I suppose I fainted away when 
you knocked me down.” 

“ Yes, sir, thank God,” said Adam. I thought it was 
worse.” 

What ! you thought you ’d done for me, eh ? Come, 
help me on my legs.” 

I feel terribly shaky and dizzy,” Arthur said, as he stood 
leaning on Adam’s arm ; “ that blow of yours must have 
come against me like a battering-ram. I don’t believe I 
can walk alone.” 

Lean on me, sir ; I ’ll get you along,” said Adam. “ Or 
will you sit down a bit longer, on my coat here, and I ’ll 
prop y’ up? You ’ll perhaps be better in a minute or two.’’ 

“ No,” said Arthur. “ I ’ll go to the Hermitage, — I 
think I ’ve got some brandy there. There ’s a short road to 

3or 


ADAM BEDE 


it a little farther on, near the gate. If you ’ll just help me 
on.” 

They walked slowly, with frequent pauses, but without 
speaking again. In both of them the concentration in the 
present which had attended the first moments of Arthur’s 
revival, had now given way to a vivid recollection of the 
previous scene. It was nearly dark in the narrow path 
among the trees, but within the circle of fir-trees round the 
Hermitage there was room for the growing moonlight to 
enter in at the windows. Their steps were noiseless on the 
thick carpet of fir-needles, and the outward stillness seemed 
to heighten their inward consciousness as Arthur took the 
key out of his pocket and placed it in Adam’s hand for him 
to open the door. Adam had not known before that Arthur 
had furnished the old Hermitage and made it a retreat for 
himself, and it was a surprise to him when he opened the 
door to see a snug room with all the signs of frequent habi- 
tation. 

Arthur loosed Adam’s arm and threw himself on the otto- 
man. “ You ’ll see my hunting-bottle somewhere,” he said. 
“ A leather case with a bottle and glass in.” 

Adam was not long in finding the case. “ There ’s very 
little brandy in it, sir,” he said, turning it downwards over 
the glass, as he held it before the window, “ hardly this little 
glassful.” 

“ Well, give me that,” said Arthur, with the peevishness 
of physical depression. 

When he had taken some sips, Adam said : “ Had n’t I 

better run to th’ house, sir, and get some more brandy? I 
can be there and back pretty soon. It ’ll be a stiff walk 
home for you, if you don’t have something to revive you.” 

“ Yes, go. But don’t say I ’m ill. Ask for my man Pym, 
and tell him to get it from Mills, and not to say I ’m at the 
Hermitage. Get some water too.” 

Adam was relieved to have an active task ; both of them 
were relieved to be apart from each other for a short time. 
But Adam’s swift pace could not still the eager pain of 
thinking, — of living again with concentrated suffering 
through the last wretched hour, and looking out from it 
over all the new, sad future. 

30S 


A DILEMMA 


Arthur lay still for some minutes after Adam was gone ; 
but presently he rose feebly from the ottoman, and peered 
about slowly in the broken moonlight, seeking something. 
It was a short bit of wax candle that stood amongst /a con- 
fusion of writing and drawing materials. There was more 
searching for the means of lighting the candle ; and when 
that was done, he went cautiously round the room, as if 
wishing to assure himself of the presence or absence of 
something. At last he had found a slight thing, which he 
put first in his pocket, and then, on a second thought, took 
cut again, and thrust deep down into a waste-paper basket. 
It was a woman's little pink silk neckerchief. He set the 
candle on the table, and threw himself down on the ottoman 
again, exhausted with the effort. 

When Adam came back with his supplies, his entrance 
awoke Arthur from a doze. 

“ That 's right," Arthur said ; I 'm tremendously in want 
of some brandy-vigour." 

I 'm glad to see you Ve got a light, sir," said Adam. 

I Ve been thinking I 'd better have asked for a lanthorn." 

No, no ; the candle will last long enough, — I shall soon 
be up to walking home now." 

“ I can’t go before I Ve seen you safe home, sir," said 
Adam, hesitatingly. 

No ; it will be better for you to stay, — sit down." 

Adam sat down, and they remained opposite to each 
other in uneasy silence, while Arthur slowly drank brandy- 
and-water with visibly renovating effect. He began to lie 
in a more voluntary position, and looked as if he were less 
overpowered by bodily sensations. Adam was keenly alive 
to these indications, and as his anxiety about Arthur's con- 
dition began to be allayed, he felt more of that impatience 
which every one knows who has had his just indignation 
suspended by the physical state of the culprit. Yet there 
was one thing on his mind to be done before he could recur 
to remonstrance : it was to confess what had been unjust in 
his own words. Perhaps he longed all the more to make 
this confession, that his indignation might be free again; 
and as he saw the signs of returning ease in Arthur, the 
words again and again came to his lips and went back, 

309 


ADAM BEDE 


checked by the thought that it would be better to leave 
everything till to-morrow. As long as they were silent they 
did not look at each other; and a foreboding came across 
Adam that if they began to speak as though they remem- 
bered the past, — if they looked at each other with full rec- 
ognition, — they must take fire again. So they sat in silence 
till the bit of wax candle flickered low in the socket ; the 
silence all the while becoming more irksome to Adam. Ar- 
thur had just poured out some more brandy-and- water, and 
he threw one arm behind his head and drew’ up one leg in 
an attitude of recovered ease, which was an irresistible 
temptation to Adam to speak what was on his mind. 

You begin to feel more yourself again, sir,” he said, 
as the candle went out, and they were half hidden from each 
other in the faint moonlight. 

^'Yes. I don’t feel good for much, — very lazy, and not 
inclined to move ; but I ’ll go home when I ’ve taken this 
dose.” 

There was a slight pause before Adam said, — 

My temper got the better of me, and I said things as 
w^as n’t true. I ’d no right to speak as if you ’d known you 
was doing me an injury ; you ’d no grounds for knowing it ; 
I ’ve always kept what I felt for her as secret as I could.” 

He paused again before he went on. 

“ And perhaps I judged you too harsh, — I’m apt to be 
harsh ; and you may have acted out o’ thoughtlessness more 
than I should ha’ believed was possible for a man with a 
heart and a conscience. We ’re not all put together alike, 
and we may misjudge one another. God knows, it ’s all the 
joy I could have now, to think the best of you.” 

Arthur wanted to go home without saying any more, — 
he was too painfully embarrassed in mind, as well as too 
w’^eak in body, to wish for any further explanation to-night. 
And yet it was a relief to him that Adam reopened the sub- 
ject in a way the least difficult for him to answer. Arthur 
was in the wretched position of an open, generous man, who 
has committed an error which makes deception seem a ne- 
cessity. The native impulse to give truth in return for 
truth, to meet trust with frank confession, must be sup- 
pressed, and duty was become a question of tactics. His 


310 


A DILEMMA 


deed was reacting upon him, — was already governing him 
tyrannously, and forcing him into a course that jarred with 
his habitual feelings. The only aim that seemed admissible 
to him now was to deceive Adam to the utmost: to make 
Adam think better of him than he deserved. And when he 
heard the words of honest retraction, — when he heard 
the sad appeal with which Adam ended, — he was obliged 
to rejoice in the remains of ignorant confidence it implied. 
He did not answer immediately, for he had to be judicious 
and not truthful. 

Say no more about our anger, Adam,” he said at last, 
very languidly, for the labour of speech was unwelcome to 
him; “I forgive your momentary injustice, — it was quite 
natural, with the exaggerated notions you had in your 
mind. We shall be none the worse friends in future, I hope, 
because we Ve fought ; you had the best of it, and that was 
as it should be, for I believe I Ve been most in the wrong of 
the two. Come, let us shake hands.” 

Arthur held out his hand, but Adam sat still. 

'' I don’t like to say ' No ’ to that, sir,” he said ; “ but I 
can’t shake hands till it ’s clear what we mean by ’t. I was 
wrong when I spoke as if you ’d done me an injury know- 
ingly, but I was n’t wrong in what I said before, about your 
behaviour t’ Hetty, and I can’t shake hands with you as if 
I held you my friend the same as ever, till you ’ve cleared 
that up better.” 

Arthur swallowed his pride and resentment as he drew 
back his hand. He was silent for some moments, and then 
said, as indifferently as he could, — 

‘‘ I don’t know what you mean by clearing up, Adam. 
I ’ve told you already that you think too seriously of a little 
fiirtation. But if you are right in supposing there is any 
danger in it, — I’m going away on Saturday, and there will 
be an end of it. As for the pain it has given you, I ’m heart- 
ily sorry for it. I can say no more.” 

Adam said nothing, but rose from his chair, and stood 
with his face towards one of the windows, as if looking at 
the blackness of the moonlit fir-trees ; but he was in reality 
conscious of nothing but the conflict within him. It was of 
no use now, — his resolution not to speak till to-morrow; 


ADAM BEDE 


he must speak there and then. But it was several minutes 
before he turned round and stepped nearer to Arthur, stand- 
ing and looking down on him as he lay. 

“ It ’ll be better for me to speak plain, he said, with evi- 
dent effort, “ though it ’s hard work. You see, sir, this 
is n’t a trifle to me, whatever it may be to you. I ’m none o’ 
them men as can go making love first to one woman and 
then t’ another, and don’t think it much odds which of 
’em I take. What I feel for Hetty ’s a different sort o’ love, 
such as J believe nobody can know much about but them as 
feel it, and God has given it to ’em. She ’s more nor every- 
thing else to me, all but my conscience and my good name. 
And if it ’s true what you ’ve been saying all along, — and 
if it ’s only been trifling and flirting as you call it, as ’ll be 
put an end to by your going away, — why, then I ’d wait, 
and hope her heart ’ud turn to me after all. I ’m loath to 
think you ’d speak false to me, and I ’ll believe your word, 
liowever things may look.” 

“ You would be wronging Hetty more than me not to 
believe it,” said Arthur, almost violently, starting up from 
the ottoman and moving away. But he threw himself into 
a chair again directly, saying more feebly, “ You seem to 
forget that in suspecting me, you are casting imputations 
upon her.” 

“ Nay, sir,” Adam said, in a calmer voice, as if he were 
half relieved, — for he was too straightforward to make a 
distinction between a direct falsehood and an indirect one, 
— “ nay, sir, things don’t lie level between Hetty and you. 
You ’re acting with your eyes open, whatever you may do, 
but how do you know what ’s in her mind ? She ’s all but a 
child, — as any man with a conscience in him ought to feel 
bound to take care on. And whatever you may think, I 
know you ’ve disturbed her mind. I know she ’s been fixing 
her heart on you ; for there ’s a many things clear to me now 
as I did n’t understand before. But you seem to make light 
o’ what she may feel, — you don’t think o’ that.” 

‘‘ Good God, Adam, let me alone ! ” Arthur burst out im- 
petuously : “ I feel it enough without your worrying me.” 

He was aware of his indiscretion as soon as the words 
had escaped him. 


312 


A DILEMMA 


Well, then, if you feel it,” Adam rejoined eagerly, '' if 
you feel as you may ha’ put false notions into her mind, and 
made her believe as you loved her, when all the while you 
meant nothing, I ’ve this demand to make of you, — I ’m 
not speaking for myself, but for her. I ask you t’ undeceive 
her before you go away. Y’ are n’t going away forever ; 
and if you leave her behind with a notion in her head o’ 
your feeling about her the same as she feels about you, 
she ’ll be hankering after you, and the mischief may get 
worse. It may be a smart to her now, but it ’ll save her pain 
i’ th’ end. I ask you to write a letter, — you may trust 
to my seeing as she gets it : tell her the truth, and take blame 
to yourself for behaving as you ’d no right to do to a young 
woman as is n’t your equal. I speak plain, sir ; but I can’t 
speak any other way. There ’s nobody can take care o’ 
Hetty in this thing but me.” 

“ I can do what I think needful in the matter,” said Ar- 
thur, more and more irritated by mingled distress and per- 
plexity, without giving promises to you. I shall take what 
measures I think proper.” 

“ No,” said Adam, in an abrupt, decided tone, that 
won’t do. I must know what ground I ’m treading on. I 
must be safe as you ’ve put an end to what ought never to 
ha’ been begun. I don’t forget what ’s owing to you as a 
gentleman ; but in this thing we ’re man and man, and I 
can’t give up.” 

There was no answer for some moments. Then Arthur 
said, “ I ’ll see you to-morrow. I can bear no more now ; 
I ’m ill.” He rose as he spoke, and reached his cap, as if in- 
tending to go. 

“ You won’t see her again ! ” Adam exclaimed, with" a 
flash of recurring anger and suspicion, moving towards the 
door and placing his back against it. “ Either tell me she 
can never be my wife, — tell me you ’ve been lying, — or 
else promise me what I ’ve said.” 

Adam, uttering this alternative, stood like a terrible fate 
before Arthur, who had moved forward a step or two, and 
now stopped, faint, shaken, sick in mind and body. It 
seemed long to both of them — that inward struggle of Ar- 
thur’s — before he said feebly, '' I promise ; let me go.” 


313 


ADAM BEDE 


Adam moved away from the door and opened it, but 
when Arthur reached the step, he stopped again and leaned 
against the door-post. 

“ You ’re not well enough to walk alone, sir,” said Adam. 

Take my arm again.” 

Arthur made no answer, and presently walked on, Adam 
following. But after a few steps, he stood still again, and 
said coldly, I believe I must trouble you. It ’s getting late 
now, and there may be an alarm set up about me at home.” 

Adam gave his arm, and they walked on without uttering 
a word, till they came where the basket and the tools lay. 

‘‘ I must pick up the tools, sir,” Adam said. ‘‘ They ’re 
my brother’s. I doubt they ’ll be rusted. If you ’ll please 
to wait a minute.” 

Arthur stood still without speaking, and no other word 
passed between them till they were at the side entrance, 
where he hoped to get in without being seen by any one. 
He said then, “ Thank you ; I need n’t trouble you any fur- 
ther.” 

“ What time will it be conven’ent for me to see you to- 
morrow, sir ? ” said Adam. 

“You may send me word that you’re here at five 
o’clock,” said Arthur ; “ not before.” 

“ Good-night, sir,” said Adam. But he heard no reply ; 
Arthur had turned into the house. 


CHAPTER XXIX. 

THE NEXT MORNING. 

A rthur did not pass a sleepless night ; he slept long 
and well, — for sleep comes to the perplexed, if the 
perplexed are only weary enough. But at seven he rang his 
bell and astonished Pym by declaring he was going to get 
up, and must have breakfast brought to him at eight. 

“ And see that my mare is saddled at half-past eight, and 
tell my grandfather when he ’s down that I ’m better this 
morning, and am gone for a ride.” 

He had been awake an hour, and could rest in bed no 


314 


THE NEXT MORNING 


longer. In bed our yesterdays are too oppressive ; if a man 
can only get up, though it be but to whistle or to smoke, 
he has a present which offers some resistance to the past, 
— sensations which assert themselves against tyrannous 
memories. And if there were such a thing as taking aver- 
ages of feeling, it would certainly be found that in the hunt- 
ing and shooting seasons regret, self-reproach, and mortified 
pride weigh lighter on country gentlemen than in late spring 
and summer. Arthur felt that he should be more of a man 
on horseback. Even the presence of Pym, waiting on him 
with the usual deference, was a reassurance to him after the 
scenes of yesterday. P'or, with Arthur’s sensitiveness to 
opinion, the loss of Adam’s respect was a shock to his self- 
contentment which suffused his imagination with the sense 
that he had sunk in all eyes ; as a sudden shock of fear 
from some real peril makes a nervous woman afraid even 
to step, because all her perceptions are suffused with a sense 
of danger. 

Arthur’s, as you know, was a loving nature. Deeds of 
kindness were as easy to him as a bad habit ; they were 
the common issue of his weaknesses and good qualities, of 
his egoism and his sympathy. He did n’t like to witness 
pain, and he liked to have grateful eyes beaming on him 
as the giver of pleasure. When he was a lad of seven, he 
one day kicked down an old gardener’s pitcher of broth, 
from no motive but a kicking impulse, not reflecting that 
it was the old man’s dinner ; but on learning that sad fact, 
he took his favourite pencil-case and a silver-hafted knife 
out of his pocket and offered them as compensation. He 
had been the same Arthur ever since, trying to make all 
offences forgotten in benefits. If there were any bitterness 
in his nature, it could only show itself against the man who 
refused to be conciliated by him. And perhaps the time 
was come for some of that bitterness to rise. At the first 
moment Arthur had felt pure distress and self-reproach at 
discovering that Adam’s happiness was involved in his re- 
lation to Hetty; if there had been a possibility of making 
Adam tenfold amends, — if deeds of gift, or any other deeds, 
could have restored Adam’s contentment and regard for 
him as a benefactor, — Arthur would not only have exe- 

315 


ADAM BEDE 


cuted them without hesitation, but would have felt bound 
all the more closely to Adam, and would never have been 
weary of making retribution. But Adam could receive no 
amends ; his suffering could not be cancelled ; his respect 
and affection could not be recovered by any prompt deeds 
of atonement. He stood like an immovable obstacle against 
which no pressure could avail ; an embodiment of what 
Arthur most shrank from believing in, — the irrevocable- 
ness of his own wrongdoing. The words of scorn, the re- 
fusal to shake hands, the mastery asserted over him in 
their last conversation in the Hermitage, — above all, the 
sense of having been knocked down, to which a man does 
not very well reconcile himself, even under the most heroic 
circumstances, — pressed on him with a galling pain which 
was stronger than compunction. Arthur would so gladly 
have persuaded himself that he had done no harm ! And 
if no one had told him the contrary, he could have per- 
suaded himself so much better. Nemesis can seldom forge 
a sword for herself out of our consciences, — out of the suf- 
fering we feel in the suffering we may have caused; there 
is rarely metal enough there to make an effective weapon. 
Our moral sense learns the manners of good society, and 
smiles when others smile ; but when some rude person gives 
rough names to our actions, she is apt to take part against 
us. And so it was with Arthur : Adam’s judgment of him, 
Adam’s grating words, disturbed his self-soothing argu- 
ments. 

Not that Arthur had been at ease before Adam’s dis- 
covery. Struggles and resolves had transformed themselves 
into compunction and anxiety. He was distressed for 
Hetty’s sake, and distressed for his own, that he must leave 
her behind. He had always, both in making and breaking 
resolutions, looked beyond his passion, and seen that it 
must speedily end in separation ; but his nature was too 
ardent and tender for him not to suffer at this parting ; and 
on Hetty’s account he was filled with uneasiness. He had 
found out the dream in which she was living, — that she 
was to be a lady in silks and satins; and when he had first 
talked to her about his going away, she had asked him 
tremblingly to let her go with him and be married. It 

316 


THE NEXT MORNING 


was his painful knowledge of this which had given the most 
exasperating sting to Adam’s reproaches. He had said no 
word with the purpose of deceiving her, her vision was all 
spun by her own childish fancy ; but he was obliged to con- 
fess to himself that it was spun half out of his own actions. 
And to increase the mischief, on this last evening he had 
not dared to hint the truth to Hetty; he had been obliged 
to soothe her with tender, hopeful words, lest he should 
throw her into violent distress. He felt the situation acute- 
ly; felt the sorrow of the dear thing in the present, and 
thought with a darker anxiety of the tenacity which her 
feelings might have in the future. That was the one sharp 
point which pressed against him ; every other he could evade 
by hopeful self-persuasion. The whole thing had been se- 
cret; the Poysers had not the shadow of a suspicion. No 
one, except Adam, knew anything of what had passed, — 
no one else was likely to know ; for Arthur had impressed 
on Hetty that it would be fatal to betray, by word or look, 
that there had been the least intimacy between them; and 
Adam, who knew half their secret, would rather help them 
to keep it than betray it. It was an unfortunate business 
altogether, but there was no use in making it worse than 
it was, by imaginary exaggerations and forebodings of 
evil that might never come. The temporary sadness for 
Hetty was the worst consequence; he resolutely turned 
away his eyes from any bad consequence that was not de- 
monstrably inevitable. But — but Hetty might have had the 
trouble in some other way if not in this ; and perhaps here- 
after he might be able to do a great deal for her, and make 
up to her for all the tears she would shed about him. She 
would owe the advantage of his care for her in future years 
to the sorrow she had incurred now. So good comes out 
of evil; such is the beautiful arrangement of things! 

Are you inclined to ask whether this can be the same 
Arthur who, two months ago, had that freshness of feeling, 
that delicate honour which shrinks from wounding even a 
sentiment, and does not contemplate any more positive of- 
fence as possible for it? — who thought that his own self- 
respect was a higher tribunal than any external opinion? 
The same, I assure you, only under different conditions. 

317 


ADAM BEDE 


Our deeds determine us, as much as we determine our 
deeds; and until we know what has been or will be the 
peculiar combination of outward with inward facts, which 
constitutes a man’s critical actions, it will be better not to 
think ourselves wise about his character. There is a terri- 
ble coercion in our deeds which may first turn the honest 
man into a deceiver, and then reconcile him to the change; 
for this reason, — that the second wrong presents itself to 
him in the guise of the only practicable right. The action 
which before commission has been seen with that blended 
common-sense and fresh untarnished feeling which is the 
healthy eye of the soul, is looked at afterwards with the lens 
of apologetic ingenuity, through which all things that men 
call beautiful and ugly are seen to be made up of textures 
very much alike. Europe adjusts itself tO' a fait accompli y 
and so does an individual character, — until the placid ad- 
justment is disturbed by a convulsive retribution. 

No man can escape this vitiating effect of an offence 
against his own sentiment of right ; and the effect was the 
stronger in Arthur because of that very need of self-re- 
spect which, while his conscience was still at ease, was one 
of his best safeguards. Self-accusation was too painful to 
him, — he could not face it. He must persuade himself 
that he had not been very much to blame; he began even 
to pity himself for the necessity he was under of deceiving 
Adam, — it was a course so opposed to the honesty of his 
own nature ; but then, it was the only right thing to do. 

Well, whatever had been amiss in him, he was miserable 
enough in consequence, — miserable about Hetty ; miser- 
able about this letter that he had promised to write, and 
that seemed at one moment to be a gross barbarity, at an- 
other perhaps the greatest kindness he could do to her. 
And across all this reflection would dart every now and then 
a sudden impulse of passionate defiance towards all con- 
sequences ; he would carry Hetty away, and all other con- 
siderations might go to . . . 

In this state of mind the four walls of his room made an 
intolerable prison to him ; they seemed to hem in and press 
down upon him all the crowd of contradictory thoughts 
and conflicting feelings, some of which would fly away in 

31S 


THE NEXT MORNING 

the open air. He had only an hour or two to make up his 
mind in, and he must get clear and calm. Once on Meg’s 
back, in the fresh air of that fine morning, he should be 
more master of the situation. 

The pretty creature arched her bay neck in the sunshine, 
and pawed the gravel, and trembled with pleasure when 
her master stroked her nose, and patted her, and talked to 
her even in a more caressing tone than usual. He loved 
her the better because she knew nothing of his secrets. But 
Meg was quite as well acquainted with her master’s mental 
state as many others of her sex with the mental condition 
of the nice young gentlemen towards whom their hearts are 
in a state of fluttering expectation. 

Arthur cantered for five miles beyond the Chase, till he 
was at the foot of a hill where there were no hedges or 
trees to hem in the road. Then he threw the bridle on 
Meg’s neck, and prepared to make up his mind. 

Hetty knew that their meeting yesterday must be the last 
before Arthur went away; there was no possibility of their 
contriving another without exciting suspicion ; and she was 
like a frightened child, unable to think of anything, only 
able to cry at the mention of parting, and then put her face 
up to have the tears kissed away. He could do nothing but 
comfort her, and lull her into dreaming on. A letter would 
be a dreadfully abrupt way of awakening her! Yet there 
was truth in what Adam said, — that it would save her 
from a lengthened delusion, which might be worse than a 
sharp immediate pain. And it was the only way of satis- 
fying Adam, who must be satisfied, for more reasons than 
one. If he could have seen her again I But that was im- 
possible; there was such a thorny hedge of hindrances be- 
tween them, and an imprudence would be fatal. And yet, 
if he coidd see her again, what good would it do? Only 
cause him to suffer more from the sight of her distress and 
the remembrance of it. Away from him she w^as surrounded 
by all the motives to self-control. 

A sudden dread here fell like a shadow across his im- 
agination, — the dread lest she should do something violent 
in her grief ; and close upon that dread came another, which 
deepened the shadow. But he shook them off with the 

319 


ADAM BEDE 


force of youth and hope. What was the ground for paint- 
ing the future in that dark way? It was just as likely to be 
the reverse. Arthur told himself he did not deserve that 
things should turn out badly, — he had never meant be- 
forehand to do anything his conscience disapproved, — he 
had been led on by circumstances. There was a sort of im- 
plicit confidence in him that he was really such a good fel- 
low at bottom. Providence would not treat him harshly. 

At all events, he could n’t help what would come now ; 
all he could do was to take what seemed the best course at 
the present moment. And he persuaded himself that that 
course was to make the way open between Adam and Hetty. 
Her heart might really turn to Adam, as he said, after a 
while; and in that case there would have been no great 
harm done, since it was still Adam’s ardent wish to make 
her his wife. To be sure, Adam was deceived, — deceived 
in a way that Arthur would have resented as a deep wrong 
if it had been practised on himself. That was a reflection 
that marred the consoling prospect. Arthur’s cheeks even 
burned in mingled shame and irritation at the thought. 
But what could a man do in such a dilemma? He was 
bound in honour to say no word that could injure Hetty; 
his first duty was to guard her. He would never have told 
or acted a lie on his own account. Good God ! what a 
miserable fool he was to have brought himself into such a 
dilemma ; and yet, if ever a man had excuses, he had. (Pity 
that consequences are determined not by excuses but by 
actions !) 

Well, the letter must be written; it was the only means 
that promised a solution of the difficulty. The tears came 
into Arthur’s eyes as he thought of Hetty reading it; but 
it would be almost as hard for him to write it, — he was 
not doing anything easy to himself, and this last thought 
helped him to arrive at a conclusion. He could never de- 
liberately have taken a step which inflicted pain on another 
and left himself at ease. Even a movement of jealousy at 
the thought of giving up Hetty to Adam went to convince 
him that he was making a sacrifice. 

When once he had come to this conclusion, he turned 
Meg round, and set off home again in a canter. The letter 

320 


THE NEXT MORNING 


should be written the first thing, and the rest of u 
would be filled up with other business; he should hav^ 
time to look behind him. Happily Irwine and Gawain 
were coming to dinner, and by twelve o’clock the next day 
he should have left the Chase miles behind him. There 
was some security in this constant occupation against an 
uncontrollable impulse seizing him to rush to Hetty and 
thrust into her hand some mad proposition that would undo 
everything. Faster and faster went the sensitive Meg, at 
every slight sign from her rider, till the canter had passed 
into a swift gallop. 

“ I thought they said th’ young mester war took ill last 
night,” said sour old John, the groom, at dinner-time in the 
servants’ hall. “ He ’s been ridin’ fit to split the mare i’ 
two this forenoon.” 

“ That ’s happen one o’ the symptims, John,” said the 
facetious coachman. 

“ Then I wish he war let blood for ’t ; that ’s all,” said 
John, grimly. 

Adam had been early at the Chase to know how Arthur 
was, and had been relieved from all anxiety about the ef- 
fects of his blow by learning that he was gone out for a 
ride. At five o’clock he was punctually there again, and 
sent up word of his arrival. In a few minutes Pym came 
down with a letter in his hand, and gave it to Adam, saying 
that the Captain was too busy’to see him, and had written 
everything he had to say. The letter was directed to Adam, 
but he went out of doors again before opening it. It con- 
tained a sealed enclosure directed to Hetty. On the inside 
of the cover Adam read : — 

In the enclosed letter I have written everything you wish. I leave 
it to you to decide whether you will be doing best to deliver it to 
Hetty or to return it to me. Ask yourself once more whether you are 
not taking a measure which may pain her more than mere silence. 

There is no need of our seeing each other again now. We shall 
meet with better feelings some months hence. 

A. D. '' 

** Perhaps he ’s i’ th’ right on ’t not to see me,” thought 
Adam. It ’s no use meeting to say more hard words, and 

21 


321 


ADAM BEDE 


j use meeting to shake hands and say we ^re friends 
xn. We ’re not friends, an’ it ’s better not to pretend it. 
. know forgiveness is a man’s duty; but, to my thinking, 
that can only mean as you ’re to give up all thoughts o’ 
taking revenge ; it can never mean as you ’re t’ have your 
old feelings back again, for that ’s not possible. He ’s not 
the same man to me, and I can’t feel the same towards him. 
God help me ! I don’t know whether I feel the same towards 
anybody ; I seem as if I ’d been measuring my work from 
a false line, and had got it all to measure over again.” 

But the question about delivering the letter to Hetty soon 
absorbed Adam’s thoughts. Arthur had procured some re- 
lief to himself by throwing the decision on Adam with a 
warning ; and Adam, who was not given to hesitation, hesi- 
tated here. He determined to feel his way, — to ascertain 
as well as he could what was Hetty’s state of mind before 
he decided on delivering the letter. 


CHAPTER XXX. 

THE DELIVERY OF THE LETTER. 

T he next Sunday Adam joined the Poysers on their 
way out of church, hoping for an invitation to go 
home with them. He had the letter in his pocket, and was 
anxious to have an opportunity of talking to Hetty alone. 
He could not see her face at church, for she had changed 
her seat ; and when he came up to her to shake hands, her 
manner was doubtful and constrained. He expected this, 
for it was the first time she had met him since she had been 
aware that he had seen her with Arthur in the Grove. 

Come, you ’ll go on with us, Adam,” Mr. Poyser said 
when they reached the turning ; and as soon as they were in 
the fields Adam ventured to offer his arm to Hetty. The 
children soon gave them an opportunity of lingering behind 
a little, and then Adam said, — 

“ Will you contrive for me to walk out in the garden a 
bit with you this evening, if it keeps fine, Hetty ? I ’ve 
something partic’ler to talk to you about.” 


322 


THE DELIVERY OF THE LETTER 


Hetty said, “Very well/' She was really as anxious as 
Adam was that she should have some private talk with him. 
She wondered what he thought of her and Arthur ; he must 
have seen them kissing, she knew, but she had no concep- 
tion of the scene that had taken place between Arthur and 
Adam. Her first feeling had been that Adam would be very 
angry with her, and perhaps would tell her aunt and uncle ; 
but it never entered her mind that he would dare to say any- 
thing to Captain Donnithorne. It was a relief to her that 
he behaved so kindly to her to-day, and wanted to speak to 
her alone ; for she had trembled when she found he was 
going home with them, lest he should mean “ to tell." But 
now he wanted to talk to her by herself, she should learn 
what he thought, and what he meant to do. She felt a cer- 
tain confidence that she could persuade him not to do any- 
thing she did not want him to do; she could perhaps even 
make him believe that she did n’t care for Arthur ; and as 
long as Adam thought there was any hope of her having 
him, he would do just what she liked, she knew. Besides, 
she must go on seeming to encourage Adam, lest her uncle 
and aunt should be angry, and suspect her of having some 
secret lover. 

Hetty’s little brain was busy with this combination, as 
she hung on Adam’s arm, and said “ Yes ’’ or “ No ’’ to 
some slight observations of his about the many hawthorn- 
berries there would be for the birds this next winter, and 
the low-hanging clouds that would hardly hold up till morn- 
ing. And when they rejoined her aunt and uncle, she could 
pursue her thoughts without interruption ; for Mr. Poyser 
held that though a young man might like to have the wom- 
an he was courting on his arm, he would nevertheless be 
glad of a little reasonable talk about business the while; 
and, for his own part, he was curious to hear the most re- 
cent news about the Chase Farm. So, through the rest of 
the walk, he claimed Adam’s conversation for himself; and 
Hetty laid her small plots, and imagined her little scenes of 
cunning blandishment, as she walked along by the hedge- 
rows on honest Adam’s arm, quite as well as if she had been 
an elegantly clad coquette alone in her boudoir. For if a 
country beauty in clumsy shoes be only shallow-hearted 

323 


ADAM BEDE 


enough, it is astonishing how closely her mental processes 
may resemble those of a lady in society and crinoline, who 
applies her refined intellect to the problem of committing 
indiscretions without compromising herself. Perhaps the 
resemblance was not much the less because Hetty felt very 
unhappy all the while. The parting with Arthur was a dou- 
ble pain to her; mingling with the tumult of passion and 
vanity, there was a dim, undefined fear that the future 
might shape itself in some way quite unlike her dream. She 
clung to the comforting, hopeful words Arthur had uttered 
in their last meeting, — I shall come again at Christmas, 
and then we will see what can be done.” She clung to the 
belief that he was so fond of her that he would never be 
happy without her ; and she still hugged her secret — that 
a great gentleman loved her — with gratified pride, as a 
superiority over all the girls she knew. But the uncertainty 
of the future, the possibilities to which she could give no 
shape, began to press upon her like the invisible weight of 
air; she was alone on her little island of dreams, and all 
around her was the dark unknown water where Arthur was 
gone. She could gather no elation of spirits now by look- 
ing forward, but only by looking backward to build confi- 
dence on past words and caresses. But occasionally, since 
Thursday evening, her dim anxieties had been almost lost 
behind the more definite fear that Adam might betray what 
he knew to her uncle and aunt ; and his sudden proposition 
to talk to her alone had set her thoughts to work in a new 
way. She was eager not to lose this evening’s opportunity ; 
and after tea, when the boys were going into the garden, 
and Totty begged to go with them, Hetty said, with an 
alacrity that surprised Mrs. Poyser, — 

“ I ’ll go with her, aunt.” 

It did not seem at all surprising that Adam said he would 
go too ; and soon he and Hetty were left alone together on 
the walk by the filbert-trees, while the boys were busy else- 
where gathering the large, unripe nuts to play at “ cob- 
nut ” with, and Totty was watching them with a puppy- 
like air of contentment. It was but a short time — hardly 
two months — since Adam had had his mind filled with 
delicious hopes, as he stood by Hetty’s side in this garden. 

324 


THE DELIVERY OF THE LETTER 


The remembrance of that scene had often been with him 
since Thursday evening, — the sunlight through the apple- 
tree boughs, the red bunches, Hetty’s sweet blush. It came 
importunately now, on this sad evening, with the low- 
hanging clouds ; but he tried to suppress it, lest some emo- 
tion should impel him to say more than was needful for 
Hetty’s sake. 

After what I saw on Thursday night, Hetty,” he began, 

you won’t think me making too free in what I ’m going 
to say. If you was being courted by any man as ’ud make 
you his wife, and I ’d known you was fond of him and 
meant to have him, I should have no right to speak a word 
to you about it ; but when I see you ’re being made love to 
by a gentleman as can never marry you, and doesna think 
o’ marrying you, I feel bound t’ interfere for you. I can’t 
speak about it to them as are i’ the place o’ your parents, 
for that might bring worse trouble than ’s needful.” 

Adam’s words relieved one of Hetty’s fears, but they 
also carried a meaning which sickened her with a strength- 
ened foreboding. She was pale and trembling, and yet she 
would have angrily contradicted Adam, if she had dared 
to betray her feelings. But she was silent. 

“ You ’re so young, you know, Hetty,” he went on al- 
most tenderly, “ and y’ have n’t seen much o’ what goes 
on in the world. It ’s right for me to do what I can to save 
you from getting into trouble for want o’ your knowing 
where you ’re being led to. If anybody besides me knew 
'what I know about your meeting a gentleman, and having 
fine presents from him, they ’d speak light on you, and 
you ’d lose your character. And besides that, you ’ll have 
to suffer in your feelings, wi’ giving your love to a man 
as can never marry you, so as he might take care of you 
all your life.” 

Adam paused, and looked at Hetty, who was plucking 
the leaves from the filbert-trees, and tearing them up in her 
hand. Her little plans and preconcerted speeches had all 
forsaken her, like an ill-learnt lesson, under the terrible 
agitation produced by Adam’s words. There was a cruel 
force in their calm certainty which threatened to grapple 
and crush her flimsy hopes and fancies. She wanted to re- 

325 


ADAM BEDE 


sist them, — she wanted to throw them of? with angry con- 
tradiction ; but the determination to conceal what she felt 
still governed her. It was nothing more than a blind 
prompting now, for she was unable to calculate the .effect 
of her words. 

“ You Ve no right to say as I love him,” she said faintly 
but impetuously, plucking another rough leaf and tearing 
it up. She was very beautiful in her paleness and agitation, 
with her dark childish eyes dilated, and her breath shorter 
than usual. Adam’s heart yearned over her as he looked at 
her. Ah, if he could but comfort her, and soothe her, and 
save her from this pain ; if he had but some sort of strength 
that would enable him to rescue her poor troubled mind, 
as he would have rescued her body in the face of all danger ! 

“ I doubt it must be so, Hetty,” he said tenderly, “ for I 
canna believe you ’d let any man kiss you by yourselves, 
and give you a gold box with his hair, and go a-walking i’ 
the Grove to meet him, if you didna love him. I ’m not 
blaming you, for I know it ’ud begin by little and little, till 
at last you ’d not be able to throw it off. It ’s him I blame 
for stealin’ your love i’ that way, when he knew he could 
never make you the right amends. He ’s been trifling with 
you, and making a plaything of you, and caring nothing 
about you as a man ought to care.” 

“Yes, he does care for me; I know better nor you,” 
Hetty burst out. Everything was forgotten but the pain 
and anger she felt at Adam’s words. 

“ Nay, Hetty,” said Adam, “ if he ’d cared for you rightly, 
he ’d never ha’ behaved so. He told me himself he meant 
nothing by his kissing and presents, and he wanted to make 
me believe as you thought light of ’em too. But I know 
better nor that. I can’t help thinking as you ’ve been trust- 
ing to his loving you well enough to marry you, for all he ’s 
a gentleman ; and that ’s why I must speak to you about it, 
Hetty, — for fear you should be deceiving yourself. It ’s 
never entered his head, — the thought o’ marrying you.” 

“ How do you know ? How durst you say so ? ” said 
Hetty, pausing in her walk and trembling. The terrible 
decision of Adam’s tone shook her with fear. She had no 
presence of mind left for the reflection that Arthur would 

326 


THE DELIVERY OF THE LETTER 


have his reasons for not telling the truth to Adam, tier 
words and look were enough to determine Adam ; he must 
give her the letter. 

“ Perhaps you can’t believe me, Hetty ; because you think 
too well of him, — because you think he loves you better 
than he does. But I Ve got a letter i’ my pocket, as he 
wrote himself for me to give you. I Ve not read the letter, 
but he says he ’s told you the truth in it. But before I give 
you the letter, consider, Hetty, and don’t let it take too 
much hold on you. It wouldna ha’ been good for you if 
he ’d wanted to do such a mad thing as marry you ; it ’ud 
ha’ led to no happiness i’ th’ end.” 

Hetty said nothing; she felt a revival of hope at the 
mention of a letter which Adam had not read. There would 
be something quite different in it from what he thought. 

Adam took out the letter, but he held it in his hand still, 
while he said, in a tone of tender entreaty, — 

Don’t you bear me ill-will, Hetty, because I ’m the 
means o’ bringing you this pain. God knows I ’d ha’ borne 
a good deal worse for the sake o’ sparing it you. And think, 
— there ’s nobody but me knows about this ; and I ’ll take 
care of you as if I was your brother. You ’re the same as 
ever to me, for I don’t believe you ’ve done any wrong 
knowingly.” 

Hetty had laid her hand on the letter, but Adam did not 
loose it till he had done speaking. She took no notice of 
what he said, — she had not listened ; but when he loosed 
the letter, she put it into her pocket, without opening it, 
and then began to walk more quickly, as if she wanted to 
go in. 

‘‘ You ’re in the right not to read it just yet,” said Adam. 

Read it when you ’re by yourself. But stay out a little 
bit longer, and let us call the children. You look so white 
and ill; your aunt may take notice of it.” 

Hetty heard the warning. It recalled to her the neces- 
sity of rallying her native powers of concealment, which 
had half given way under the shock of Adam’s words. And 
she had the letter in her pocket ; she was sure there was 
comfort in that letter, in spite of Adam. She ran to find 
Totty, and soon reappeared with recovered colour, leading 

327 


ADAM BEDE 


Totty, who was making a sour face because she had been 
obliged to throw away an unripe apple that she had set her 
small teeth in. 

“ Hegh, Totty/’ said Adam, come and ride on my shoul- 
der, — ever so high, — you ’ll touch the tops o’ the trees.” 

What little child ever refused to be comforted by that 
glorious sense of being seized strongly and swung upward? 
I don’t believe Ganymede cried when the eagle carried him 
away, and perhaps deposited him on Jove’s shoulder at the 
end. Totty smiled down complacently from her secure 
height; and pleasant was the sight to her mother’s eyes, as 
she stood at the house door and saw Adam coming with 
his small burthen. 

“ Bless your sweet face, my pet,” she said, the mother’s 
strong love filling her keen eyes with mildness, as Totty 
leaned forward and put out her arms. She had no eyes for 
Hetty at that moment, and only said, without looking at 
her, You go and draw some ale, Hetty; the gells are both 
at the cheese.” 

After the ale had been drawn and her uncle’s pipe lighted, 
there was Totty to be taken to bed, and brought down again 
in her nightgown, because she would cry instead of going 
to sleep. Then there was supper to be got ready, and Hetty 
must be continually in the way to give help. Adam stayed 
till he knew Mrs. Poyser expected him to go, engaging her 
and her husband in talk as constantly as he could, for the 
sake of leaving Hetty more at ease. He lingered, because 
he wanted to see her safely through that evening, and he 
was delighted to find how much self-command she showed. 
He knew she had not had time to read the letter, but he 
did not know she was buoyed up by a secret hope that the 
letter would contradict everything he had said. It was hard 
work for him to leave her, — hard to think that he should 
not knov/ for days how she was bearing her trouble. But 
he must go at last, and all he could do was to press her 
hand gently as he said, “ Good-by,” and hope she would 
take that as a sign that if his love could ever be a refuge 
for her, it was there the same as ever. How busy his 
thoughts were, as he walked home, in devising pitying ex- 
cuses for her folly; in referring all her weakness to the 

328 


THE DELIVERY OF THE LETTER 


sweet lovingness of her nature; in blaming Arthur, with 
less and less inclination to admit that his conduct might 
be extenuated too! His exasperation at Hetty’s suffering 
— and also at the sense that she was possibly thrust forever 
out of his own reach — deafened him to any plea for the 
miscalled friend who had wrought this misery. Adam was 
a clear-sighted, fair-minded man, — a fine fellow, indeed, 
morally as well as physically. But if Aristides the Just was 
ever in love and jealous, he was at that moment not per- 
fectly magnanimous. And I cannot pretend that Adam, 
in these painful days, felt nothing but righteous indigna- 
tion and loving pity. He was bitterly jealous; and in pro- 
portion as his love made him indulgent in his judgment of 
Hetty, the bitterness found a vent in his feeling towards 
Arthur. 

“ Her head was allays likely to be turned,” he thought, 
when a gentleman, with his fine manners, and fine clothes, 
and his white hands, and that way o’ talking gentlefolks 
have, came about her, making up to her in a bold way, as a 
man could n’t do that was only her equal ; and it ’s much 
if she ’ll ever like a ft)mmon man now.” He could not help 
drawing his own hands out of his pocket, and looking at 
them, — at the hard palms and the broken finger-nails. 
“I’m a roughish fellow, altogether. I don’t know, now I 
come to think on ’t, what there is much for a woman to like 
about me; and yet I might ha’ got another wife easy 
enough, if I had n’t set my heart on her. But it ’s little mat- 
ter what other women think about me, if she can’t love me. 
She might ha’ loved me, perhaps, as likely as any other 
man, — there ’s nobody hereabouts as I ’m afraid of, if he 
had n’t come between us ; but now I shall belike be hateful 
to her because I ’m so different to him. And yet there ’s 
no telling, — she may turn round the other way, when she 
finds he ’s made light of her all the while. She may come 
to feel the vally of a man as ’ud be thankful to be bound to 
her all his life. But I must put up with it whichever way 
it is, — I ’ve only to be thankful it ’s been no worse. I am 
not th’ only man that ’s got to do without much happiness 
i’ this life. There ’s many a good bit o’ work done with 
a sad heart. It ’s God’s will, and that ’s enough for us ; we 


329 


ADAM BEDE 


should n’t know better how things ought to be than he 
does, I reckon, if we was to spend our lives i’ puzzling. But 
it ’ud ha’ gone near to spoil my work for me, if I ’d seen 
her brought to sorrow and shame, and through the man as 
I ’ve always been proud to think on. Since I ’ve been spared 
that, I ’ve no right to grumble. When a man ’s got his 
limbs whole, he can bear a smart cut or two.” 

As Adam was getting over a stile at this point in his re- 
flections, he perceived a man walking along the field before 
him. He knew it was Seth, returning from an evening 
preaching, and made haste to overtake him. 

“ I thought thee ’dst be at home before me,” he said, as 
Seth turned round to wait for him, “ for I ’m later than 
usual to-night.” 

“ Well, I ’m later too, for I got into talk, after meeting, 
with John Barnes, who has lately professed himself in a 
state of perfection, and I ’d a question to ask him about his 
experience. It ’s one o’ them subjects that lead you further 
than y’ expect, — they don’t lie along the straight road.” 

They walked along together in silence two or three min- 
utes. Adam was not inclined to enter into the subtleties of 
religious experience, but he was inclined to interchange a 
word or two of brotherly affection and confidence with Seth. 
That was a rare impulse in him, much as the brothers loved 
each other. They hardly ever spoke of personal matters, 
or uttered more than an allusion to their family troubles. 
Adam was by nature reserved in all matters of feeling, and 
Seth felt a certain timidity towards his more practical 
brother. 

“ Seth, lad,” Adam said, putting his arm on his brother’s 
shoulder, '' hast heard anything from Dinah Morris since 
she went away ? ” 

Yes,” said Seth. She told me I might write her word, 
after a while, how we went on, and how mother bore up 
under her trouble. So I wrote to her a fortnight ago, and 
told her about thee having a new employment, and how 
mother was more contented ; and last Wednesday, when I 
called at the post at Treddles’on, I found a letter from her. 
I think thee ’dst perhaps like to read it ; but I didna say 
anything about it, because thee ’st seemed so full of other 


330 


THE DELIVERY OF THE LETTER 


things. It ’s quite easy t’ read, — she writes wonderful for 
a woman.” 

Seth had drawn the letter from his pocket and held it 
out to Adam, who said, as he took it, — 

“ Ay, lad, I Ve got a tough load to carry just now, — 
thee mustna take it ill if I ’m a bit silenter and crustier nor 
usual. Trouble doesna make me care the less for thee. I 
know we shall stick together to the last.” 

“ I take nought ill o’ thee, Adam ; I know well enough 
what it means if thee ’t a bit short wi’ me now and then.” 

There ’s mother opening the door to look out for us,” 
said Adam, as they mounted the slope. “ She ’s been sitting 
i’ the dark as usual. Well, Gyp, well! art glad to see me? ” 

Lisbeth went in again quickly and lighted a candle, for 
she had heard the welcome rustling of footsteps on the 
grass, before Gyp’s joyful bark. 

“ Eh, my lads ! th’ hours war ne’er so long sin’ I war 
born as they ’n been this blessed Sunday night. What can 
ye both ha’ been doin’ till this time ? ” 

Thee shouldstna sit i’ the dark, mother,” said Adam ; 
that makes the time seem longer.” 

Eh, what am I to do wi’ burnin’ candle of a Sunday, 
when there ’s on’y me, an’ it ’s sin to do a bit o’ knittin’ ? 
The daylight ’s long enough for me to stare i’ the books as 
I canna read. It ’ud be a fine way o’ shortenin’ the time, 
to make it waste the good candle. But which on you ’s for 
ha’in’ supper? Ye mun ayther be clemmed or full, I should 
think, seein’ what time o’ night it is.” 

“ I ’m hungry, mother,” said Seth, seating himself at the 
little table, which had been spread ever since it was light. 

“ I ’ve had my supper,” said Adam. '' Here, Gyp,” he 
added, taking some cold potato from the table, and rubbing 
the rough gray head that looked up towards him. 

“ Thee needstna be gi’in’ th’ dog,” said Lisbeth ; “ I ’n 
fed him well a’ready. I ’m not like to forget him, I reckon, 
when he ’s all o’ thee I can get sight on.” 

Come, then. Gyp,” said Adam, “ we ’ll go to bed. 
Good-night, mother : I ’m very tired.” 

“ What ails him, dost know ? ” Lisbeth said to Seth, when 
Adam was gone upstairs. “ He ’s like as if he was struck 

331 


ADAM BEDE 


"for death this day or two, — he so cast down. I found 
him i' the shop this forenoon, arter thee wast gone, a-sittin’ 
an’ doin’ nothin’, — not so much as a booke afore him.” 

“ He ’s a deal o’ work upon him just now, mother,” said 
Seth, “ and I think he ’s a bit troubled in his mind. Don’t 
you take notice of it, because it hurts him when you do. 
Be as kind to him as you can, mother, and don’t say any- 
thing to vex him.” 

“ Eh, what dost talk o’ my vexin’ him ? an’ what am I 
like to be but kind ? I ’ll ma’ him a kettle-cake for break- 
fast i’ the mornin’.” 

Adam, meanwhile, was reading Dinah’s letter by the light 
of his dip candle. 

Dear Brother Seth, — Your letter lay three days beyond my 
knowing of it at the post, for I had not money enough by me to pay 
the carriage, this being a time of great need and sickness here, with 
the rains that have fallen, as if the windows of heaven were opened 
again; and to lay by money from day to day in such a time, when 
there are so many in present need of all things, would be a want of 
trust like the laying up of the manna. I speak of this, because I 
would not have you think me slow to answer, or that I had small joy 
in your rejoicing at the worldly good that has befallen your brother 
Adam. The honour and love you bear him is nothing but meet, for 
God has given him great gifts, and he uses them as the patriarch 
Joseph did, who, when he was exalted to a place of power and trust, 
yet yearned with tenderness towards his parent and his younger 
brother. 

My heart is knit to your aged mother since it was granted me to 
be near her in the day of trouble. Speak to her of me, and tell her I 
often bear her in my thoughts at evening time, when I am sitting 
in the dim light as I did with her, and we held one another’s hands, 
and I spoke the words of comfort that were given to me. Ah, that 
is a blessed time, is n’t it, Seth, when the outward light is fading, and 
the body is a little wearied with its work and its labour. Then the 
inward light shines the brighter, and we have a deeper sense of rest- 
ing on the Divine strength. I sit on my chair in the dark room and 
close my eyes, and it is as if I was out of the body and could feel 
no want forevermore. For then the very hardship and the sorrow 
and the blindness and the sin I have beheld and been ready to weep 
over, — yea, all the anguish of the children of men, which sometimes 
wraps me round like sudden darkness, — I can bear with a willing 
pain, as if I was sharing the Redeemer’s cross. For I feel it, I feel 
it, — infinite love is suffering too, — yea, in the fulness of knowledge 

332 


THE DELIVERY OF THE LETTER 


it suffers, it yearns, it mourns; and that is a blind self-seeking which 
wants to be freed from the sorrow wherewith the whole creation 
groaneth and travaileth. Surely it is not true blessedness to be free 
from sorrow, while there is sorrow and sin in the world; sorrow is 
then a part of love, and love does not seek to throw it off. It is not 
the spirit only that tells me this, — I see it in the whole work and 
word of the gospel. Is there not pleading in heaven? Is not the Man 
of Sorrows there in that crucified body wherewith he ascended? And 
is he not one with the Infinite Love itself, as our love is one with our 
sorrow? 

These thoughts have been much borne in on me of late, and I have 
seen with new clearness the meaning of those words, “ If any man 
love me, let him take up my cross.” I have heard this enlarged on 
as if it meant the troubles and persecutions we bring on ourselves by 
confessing Jesus. But surely that is a narrow thought. The true 
cross of the Redeemer was the sin and sorrow of this world, — that 
was what lay heavy on his heart, — and that is the cross we shall 
share with him, that is the cup we must drink of with him, if we 
would have any part in that Divine Love which is one with his 
sorrow. 

In my outward lot, which you ask about, I have all things and 
abound. I have had constant work in the mill, though some of the 
other hands have been turned off for a time; and my body is greatly 
strengthened, so that I feel little weariness after long walking and 
speaking. What you say about staying in your own country with 
your mother and brother shows me that you have a true guidance: 
your lot is appointed there by a clear showing, and to seek a greater 
blessing elsewhere would be like laying a false offering on the altar 
and expecting the fire from heaven to kindle it. My work and my 
joy are here among the hills, and I sometimes think I cling too 
much to my life among the people here, and should be rebellious if I 
was called away. 

I was thankful for your tidings about the dear friends at the Hall 
Farm; for though I sent them a letter, by my aunt’s desire, after I 
came back from my sojourn among them, I have had no word from 
them. My aunt has not the pen of a ready writer, and the work of 
the house is sufficient for the day, for she is weak in body. My heart 
cleaves to her and her children as the nearest of all to me in the flesh; 
yea, and to all in that house. I am carried away to them continually 
in my sleep; and often in the midst of work, and even of speech, 
the thought of them is borne in on me as if they were in need and 
trouble, which yet is dark to me. There may be some leading here; 
but I wait to be taught. You say they are all well. 

We shall sec each other again in the body, I trust, — though it may 
be not for a long while; for the brethren and sisters at Leeds are 
desirous to have me for a short space among them, when I have a 
door opened me again to leave Snowfield. 

333 


ADAM BEDE 


Farewell, dear brother, — and yet not farewell. For those children 
of God whom it has been granted to see each other face to face, and to 
hold communion together, and to feel the same spirit working in both, 
can nevermore be sundered, though the hills may lie between. For 
their souls are enlarged forevermore by that union, and they bear one 
another about in their thoughts continually as it were a new strength. 

Your faithful Sister and fellow-worker in Christ, 

Dinah Morris. 

I have not skill to write the words so small as you do, and my pen 
moves slow. And so I am straitened, and say but little of what is in 
my mind. Greet your mother for me with a kiss. She asked me to 
kiss her twice when we parted. 

Adam had refolded the letter, and was sitting medita- 
tively with his head resting on his arm at the head of the 
bed, when Seth came upstairs. 

“ Hast read the letter? ” said Seth. 

‘‘ Yes,” said Adam. “ I don’t know what I should ha’ 
thought of her and her letter if I ’d never seen her ; I dare 
say I should ha’ thought a preaching woman hateful. But 
she ’s one as makes everything seem right she says and does, 
and I seemed to see her and hear her speaking when I read 
the letter. It ’s wonderful how I remember her looks and 
her voice. She ’d make thee rare and happy, Seth ; she ’s 
just the woman for thee.” 

It ’s no use thinking o’ that,” said Seth, despondingly. 
“ She spoke so firm, and she ’s not the woman to • say one 
thing and mean another.” 

“ Nay, but her feelings may grow different. A woman 
may get to love by degrees, — the best fire doesna flare up 
the soonest. I ’d have thee go and see her by and by ; I ’d 
make it convenient for thee to be away three or four days, 
and it ’ud be no walk for thee, — only between twenty and 
thirty mile.” 

I should like to see her again, whether or no, if she 
wouldna be displeased with me for going,” said Seth. 

“ She ’ll be none displeased,” said Adam, emphatically, 
getting up and throwing off his coat. “ It might be a great 
happiness to us all, if she ’d have thee ; for mother took to 
her so wonderful, and seemed so contented to be with her,” 

334 


IN HETTY^S BED-CHAMBER 


“ Ay,” said Seth, rather timidly, “ and Dinah fond o' 
Hetty too; she thinks a deal about her.” 

Adam made no reply to that; and no other word but 
“ Good-night ” passed between them. 


CHAPTER XXXI. 

IN Hetty’s bed-chamber. 

I T was no longer light enough to go to bed without a 
candle, even in Mrs. Poyser’s early household; and 
Hetty carried one with her as she went up at last to her 
bedroom soon after Adam was gone, and bolted the door 
behind her. 

Now she would read her letter. It must — it must have 
comfort in it. How was Adam to know the truth ? It was 
always likely he should say what he did say. 

She set down the candle, and took out the letter. It had 
a faint scent of roses, which made her feel as if Arthur were 
close to her. She put it to her lips, and a rush of remem- 
bered sensations for a moment or two swept away all fear. 
But her heart began to flutter strangely, and her hands to 
tremble as she broke the seal. She read slowly ; it was not 
easy for her to read a gentleman’s handwriting, though Ar- 
thur had taken pains to write plainly. 

Dearest Hetty, — I have spoken truly when I have said that I 
loved you, and I shall never forget our love. I shall be your true 
friend as long as life lasts, and I hope to prove this to you in many 
ways. If I say anything to pain you in this letter, do not believe it is 
for want of love and tenderness towards you; for there is nothing I 
would not do for y6u, if I knew it to be really for your happiness. I 
cannot bear to think of my little Hetty shedding tears when I am 
not there to kiss them away; and if I followed only my own inclina- 
tions, I should be with her at this moment instead of writing. It is 
very hard for me to part from her, — harder still for me to write 
words which may seem unkind, though they spring from the truest 
kindness. 

Dear, dear Hetty, sweet as our love has been to me, sweet as it 
would be to me for you to love me always, I feel that it would have 
been better for us both if we had never had that happiness, and that 

335 


ADAM BEDE 


it is my duty to ask you to love me and care for me as little as you 
can. The fault has all been mine; for though I have been unable to 
resist the longing to be near you, I have felt all the while that your 
affection for me might cause you grief. I ought to have resisted my 
feelings. I should have done so, if I had been a better fellow than I 
am; -but now, since the past cannot be altered, I am bound to save 
you from any evil that I have power to prevent. And I feel it would 
be a great evil for you if your affections continued so fixed on me 
that you could think of no other man who might be able to make 
you happier by his love than I ever can, and if you continued to look 
towards something in the future which cannot possibly happen. For, 
dear Hetty, if I were to do what you one day spoke of, and make you 
my wife, I should do what you yourself would come to feel was for 
your misery instead of your welfare. I know you can never be happy 
except by marrying a man in your own station; and if I were to 
marry you now, I should only be adding to any wrong I have done, 
besides offending against my duty in the other relations of life. You 
know nothing, dear Hetty, of the world in which I must always live, 
and you would soon begin to dislike me, because there would be 
so little in which we should be alike. 

And since I cannot marry you we must part, — we must try not to 
feel like lovers any more. I am miserable while I say this, but noth- 
ing else can be. Be angry with me, my sweet one, I deserve it; but 
do not believe that I S'hall not always care for you, always be grateful 
to you, always remember my Hetty; and if any trouble should come 
that we do not now foresee, trust in me to do everything that lies in 
my power. 

I have told you where you are to direct a letter to if you want to 
write, but I put it down below lest you should have forgotten. Do 
not write unless there is something I can really do for you; for, dear 
Hetty, we must try to think of each other as little as we can. For- 
give me, and try to forget everything about me, except that I shall 
be, as long as I live, your affectionate friend, 

Arthur Donnithorne. 

Slowly Hetty had read this letter; and when she looked 
up from it there was the reflection of a blanched face in 
the old dim glass, — a white marble face with rounded child- 
ish forms, but with something sadder than a child’s pain in 
it. Hetty did not see the face, — she saw nothing, — she 
only felt that she was cold and sick and trembling. The 
letter shook and rustled in her hand. She laid it down. It 
was a horrible sensation, — this cold and trembling; it 
swept away the very ideas that produced it ; and Hetty got 
up to reach a warm cloak from her clothes-press, wrapped 

336 


IN HETTY’S BED-CHAMBER 


it round her, and sat as if she were thinking of nothing but 
getting warm. Presently she took up the letter with a firmer 
hand, and began to read it through again. The tears came 
this time, — great, rushing tears, that blinded her and 
blotched the paper. She felt nothing but that Arthur was 
cruel, — cruel to write so, cruel not to marry her. Reasons 
why he could not marry her had no existence for her mind ; 
how could she believe in any misery that could come to her 
from the fulfilment of all she had been longing for and 
dreaming of? She had not the ideas that could make up 
the notion of that misery. 

As she threw down the letter again, she caught sight of 
her face in the glass; it was reddened now, and wet with 
tears ; it was almost like a companion that she might com- 
plain to, — that would pity her. She leaned forward on her 
elbows, and looked into those dark overflooding eyes and at 
that quivering mouth, and saw how the tears came thicker 
and thicker, and how the mouth became convulsed with 
sobs; 

The shattering of all her little dream-world, the crushing 
blow on her new-born passion, afflicted her pleasure-crav- 
ing nature with an overpowering pain that annihilated all 
impulse to resistance, and suspended her anger. She sat 
sobbing till the candle went out, and then, wearied, aching, 
stupefied with crying, threw herself on the bed without un- 
dressing, and went to sleep. 

There was a feeble dawn in the room when Hetty awoke, 
a little after four o’clock, with a sense of dull misery, the 
cause of which broke upon her gradually, as she began to 
discern the objects round her in the dim light. And then 
came the frightening thought that she had to conceal her 
misery, as well as to bear it, in this dreary daylight that was 
coming. She could lie no longer. She got up and went 
towards the table; there lay the letter. She opened her 
treasure-drawer ; there lay the ear-rings and the locket, — 
the signs of all her short happiness, the signs of the life-long 
dreariness that was to follow it. Looking at the little trink- 
ets which she had once eyed and fingered so fondly as the 
earnest of her future paradise of finery, she lived back in 
the moments when they had been given to her with such 

337 


22 


ADAM BEDE 


tender caresses, such strangely pretty words, such glowing 
looks, which filled her with a bewildering, delicious surprise, 
— they were so much sweeter than she had thought anything 
could be. And the Arthur who had spoken to her and 
looked at her in this way, who was present with her now, — 
whose arm she felt round her, his cheek against hers, his 
very breath upon her, — was the cruel, cruel Arthur who 
had written that letter, — that letter which she snatched 
and crushed and then opened again, that she might read it 
once more. The half-benumbed mental condition which 
was the effect of the last night’s violent crying made it nec- 
essary to her to look again and see if her wretched thoughts 
were actually true, — if the letter was really so cruel. She 
had to hold it close to the window, else she could not have 
read it by the faint light. Yes ! it was worse, — it was more 
cruel. She crushed it up again in anger. She hated the 
writer of that letter, — hated him for the very reason that 
she hung upon him with all her love, all the girlish passion 
and vanity that made up her love. 

She had no tears this morning. She had wept them all 
away last night, and now she felt that dry-eyed morning 
misery, which is worse than the first shock, because it has 
the future in it as well as the present. Every morning to 
come, as far as her imagination could stretch, she would 
have to get up and feel that the day would have no joy for 
her. For there is no despair so absolute as that which comes 
with the first moments of our first great sorrow, when we 
have not yet known what it is to have suffered and be 
healed, to have despaired and to have recovered hope. As 
Hetty began languidly to take off the clothes she had worn 
all the night, that she might wash herself and brush her hair, 
she had a sickening sense that her life would go on in this 
way: she should always be doing things she had no pleas- 
ure in, getting up to the old tasks of work, seeing people 
she cared nothing about, going to church, and to Tred- 
dleston, and to tea with Mrs. Best, and carrying no happy 
thought with her. For her short poisonous delights had 
spoiled forever all the little joys that had once made the 
sweetness of her life, — the new frock ready for Treddleston 
fair, the party at Mr. Britton’s at Broxton wake, the beaux 

338 


IN HETTY’S BED-CHAMBER 


that she would say “ No ” to for a long while, and the pros- 
pect of the wedding that was to come at last when she would 
have a silk gown and a great many clothes all at once. These 
things were all flat and dreary to her now; everything 
would be a weariness, and she would carry about forever 
a hopeless thirst and longing. 

She paused in the midst of her languid undressing, and 
leaned against the dark old clothes-press. Her neck and 
arms were bare, her hair hung down in delicate rings ; and 
they were just as beautiful as they were that night two 
months ago, when she walked up and down this bed-cham- 
ber glowing with vanity and hope. She was not thinking 
of her neck and arms now ; even her own beauty was in- 
different to her. Her eyes wandered sadly over the dull 
old chamber, and then looked out vacantly towards the 
growing dawn. Did a remembrance of Dinah come across 
her mind, — of her foreboding words, which had made her 
angry, — of Dinah’s affectionate entreaty to think of her 
as a friend in trouble? No, the impression had been too 
slight to recur. Any affection or comfort Dinah could have 
given her would have been as indifferent to Hetty this morn- 
ing as everything else was except her bruised passion. She 
was only thinking she could never stay here and go on with 
the old life, — she could better bear something quite new 
than sinking back into the old every-day round. She would 
like to run away that very morning, and never see any of 
the old faces again. But Hetty’s was not a nature to face 
difficulties, — to dare to loose her hold on the familiar, and 
rush blindly on some unknown condition. Hers was a lux- 
urious and vain nature, not a passionate one; and if she 
were ever to take any violent measure, she must be urged 
to it by the desperation of terror. There was not much 
room for her thoughts to travel in the narrow circle of her 
imagination, and she soon fixed on the one thing she would 
do to get away from her old life ; she would ask her uncle 
to let her go to be a lady’s-maid. Miss Lydia’s maid would 
help her to get a situation, if she knew Hetty had her 
uncle’s leave. 

When she had thought of this, she fastened up her hair 

339 


ADAM BEDE 


and began to wash; it seemed more possible to her to^go 
downstairs and try to behave as usual. She would ask her 
uncle this very day. On Hetty’s blooming health it would 
take a great deal of such mental suffering as hers to leave 
any deep impress; and when she was dressed as neatly as 
usual in her working-dress, with her hair tucked up under 
her little cap, an indifferent observer would have been more 
struck with the young roundness of her cheek and neck, 
and the darkness of her eyes and eyelashes, than with any 
signs of sadness about her. But when she took up the 
crushed letter and put it in her drawer, that she might lock 
it out of sight, hard smarting tears, having no relief in them 
as the great drops had that fell last night, forced their way 
into her eyes. She wiped them away quickly : she must not 
cry in the day-time; nobody should find out how miserable 
she was, nobody should know she was disappointed about 
anything; and the thought that the eyes of her aunt and 
uncle would be upon her gave her the self-command which 
often accompanies a great dread. For Hetty looked out 
from her secret misery towards the possibility of their ever 
knowing what had happened, as the sick and weary pris- 
oner might think of the possible pillory. They would think 
her conduct shameful ; and shame was torture. That was 
poor little Hetty’s conscience. 

So she locked up her drawer, and went away to her early 
work. 

In the evening, when Mr. Poyser was smoking his pipe, 
and his good-nature was therefore at its superlative moment, 
Hetty seized the opportunity of her aunt’s absence to say, — 
Uncle, I wish you ’d let me go for a lady’s-maid.” 

Mr. Poyser took the pipe from his mouth, and looked 
at Hetty in mild surprise for some moments. She was sew- 
ing, and went on with her work industriously. 

“ Why, what ’s put that into your head, my wench ? ” 
he said at last, after he had given one conservative puff. 

I should like it, — I should like it better than farm- 
work.” 

“ Nay, nay ; you fancy so because you donna know it, my 
wench. It wouldn’t be half so good for your health, nor 
for your luck i’ life. I ’d like you to stay wi’ us till you ’ve 

340 


IN HETTY’S BED-CHAMBER 


got a good husband ; you ’re my own niece, and I would n’t 
have you go to service, though it was a gentleman’s house, 
as long as I ’ve got a home for you.” 

Mr. Poyser paused, and puffed away at his pipe. 

'' I like the needlework,” said Hetty, “ and I should get 
good wages.” 

Has your aunt been a bit sharp wi’ you ? ” said Mr. 
Poyser, not noticing Hetty’s further argument. “ You 
mustna mind that, my wench, — she does it for your good. 
She wishes you well ; an’ there is n’t many aunts as are no 
kin to you ’ud ha’ done by you as she has.” 

“ No, it is n’t my aunt,” said Hetty, “ but I should like 
the work better.” 

“ It was all very well for you to learn the work a bit ; an’ 
I gev my consent to that fast enough, sin’ Mrs. Pomfret was 
willing to teach you. For if anything was t’ happen, it ’s 
well to know how to turn your hand to different sorts o’ 
things. But I niver meant you to go to service, my wench ; 
my family ’s ate their own bread and cheese as fur back as 
anybody knows, hanna they, father? You wouldna like 
your grandchild to take wage ? ” 

“ Na-a-y,” said old Martin, with an elongation of the 
word, meant to make it bitter as well as negative, while he 
leaned forward and looked down on the floor. But the 
wench takes arter her mother. I ’d hard work t’ hould her 
in, an’ she married i’ spite o’ me, — a feller wi’ only two 
head o’ stock v/hen there should ha’ been ten on ’s farm, — 
she might well die o’ th’ inflammation afore she war thirty.” 

It was seldom the old man made so long a speech ; but 
his son’s question had fallen like a bit of dry fuel on the 
embers of a long unextinguished resentment, which had 
always made the grandfather more indifferent to Hetty 
than to his son’s children. Her mother’s fortune had been 
spent by that good-for-nought Sorrel, and Hetty had Sor- 
rel’s blood in her veins. 

“ Poor thing, poor thing ! ” said Martin the younger, who 
was sorry to have provoked this retrospective harshness. 
‘‘ She ’d but bad luck. But Hetty ’s got as good a chanche 
o’ getting a solid, sober husband as any gell i’ this country.” 

After throwing out this pregnant hint, Mr. Poyser re- 


341 


ADAM BEDE 


curred to his pipe and his silence, looking at Hetty to see 
if she did not give some sign of having renounced her ill- 
advised wish. But instead of that, Hetty, in spite of her- 
self, began to cry, half out of ill-temper at the denial, half 
out of the day's repressed sadness. 

“ Hegh, hegh ! ” said Mr. Poyser, meaning to check her 
playfully, “ don’t let ’s have any crying. Crying ’s for them 
as ha’ got no home, not tor them as want to get rid o’ one. 
What dost think? ” he continued to his wife, who now came 
back into the house-place, knitting with fierce rapidity, as 
if that movement were a necessary function, like the twit- 
tering of a crab’s antennae. 

“ Think ? — why, I think we shall have the fowl stole 
before we are much older, wi’ that gell forgetting to lock 
the pens up o’ nights. What ’s the matter now, Hetty ? 
What are you crying at ? ” 

“ Why, she ’s been wanting to go for a lady’s-maid,” said 
Mr. Poyser. I tell her we can do better for her nor that.” 

“ I thought she ’d got some maggot in her head, she ’s 
gone about wi’ her mouth buttoned up so all day. It ’s all 
wi’ going so among them servants at the Chase, as we war 
fools for letting her. She thinks it ’ud be a finer life than 
being wi’ them as are akin to her, and ha’ brought her up 
sin’ she war no bigger nor Marty. She thinks there ’s noth- 
ing belongs to being a lady’s-maid but wearing finer clothes 
nor she was born to, I ’ll be bound. It ’s what rag she can 
get to stick on her as she ’s thinking on from morning till 
night ; as I often ask her if she would n’t like to be the 
mawkin i’ the field, for then she ’d be made o’ rags inside 
and out. I ’ll never gi’ my consent to her going for a lady’s- 
maid, while she ’s got good friends to take care on her till 
she ’s married to somebody better nor one o’ them valets, as 
is neither a common man nor a gentleman, an’ must live 
on the fat o’ the land, an’ like enough to stick his hands 
under his coat-tails and expect his wife to work for him.” 

Ay, ay,” said Mr. Poyser, we must have a better hus- 
band for her nor that, and .there ’s better at hand. Come, 
my wench, give over crying, and get to bed. I ’ll do better 
for you nor letting you go for a lady’s-maid. Let ’s hear no 
more on ’t.” 


342 


IN HETTY’S BED-CHAMBER 


When Hetty was gone upstairs he said, — 

I canna make it out as she should want to go away, for 
I thought she ’d got a mind t’ Adam Bede. She ’s looked 
like it o’ late.” 

Eh, there ’s no knowing what she ’s got a liking to, for 
things take no more hold on her than if she was a dried pea. 
I believe that gell, Molly, — as is aggravatin’ enough, for 
the matter o’ that, — but I believe she ’d care more about 
leaving us and the children, for all she ’s been here but a 
year come Michaelmas, nor Hetty would. But she ’s got 
this notion o’ being a lady’s-maid wi’ going among them 
servants, — we might ha’ known what it ’ud lead to when 
we let her go to learn the fine work. But I ’ll put a stop to 
it pretty quick.” 

“ Thee ’dst be sorry to part wi’ her, if it was n’t for her 
good,” said Mr. Poyser. “ She ’s useful to thee i’ the work.” 

“Sorry? Yes; I’m fonder on her nor she deserves, — 
a little hard-hearted hussy, wanting to leave us i’ that way. 
I can’t ha’ had her about me these seven year, I reckon, and 
done for her, and taught her everything, wi’out caring about 
her. An’ here I ’m having linen spun, an’ thinking all the 
while it ’ll make sheeting and table-clothing for her when 
she ’s married, an’ she ’ll live i’ the parish wi’ us, and never 
go out of our sights, — like a fool as I am for thinking 
aught about her, as is no better nor a cherry wi’ a hard 
stone inside it.” 

“ Nay, nay, thee mustna make much of a trifle,” said Mr. 
Poyser, soothingly. “ She ’s fond on us, I ’ll be bound ; but 
she ’s young, an’ gets things in her head as she can’t rightly 
give account on. Them young fillies ’ull run away often 
wi’out knowing why.” 

Her uncle’s answers, however, had had another effect on 
Hetty besides that of disappointing her and making her cry. 
She knew quite well whom he had in his mind in his allu- 
sions to marriage, and to a sober, solid husband ; and when 
she was in her bedroom again, the possibility of her marry- 
ing Adam presented itself to her in a new light. In a mind 
where no strong sympathies are at work, where there is no 
supreme sense of right to which the agitated nature can 
cling and steady itself to quiet endurance, one of the first 

343 


ADAM BEDE 


results of sorrow is a desperate, vague clutching after any 
deed that will change the actual condition. Poor Hetty’s 
vision of consequences, at no time more than a narrow fan- 
■'tastic calculation of her own probable pleasures and pains, 
was now quite shut out by reckless irritation under present 
suffering, and she was ready for one of those convulsive, 
motiveless actions by which wretched men and women leap 
from a temporary sorrow into a life-long misery. 

Why should she not marry Adam ? She did not care what 
she did, so that it made some change in her life: She felt 
confident that he would still want to marry her, and any 
further thought about Adam’s happiness in the matter had 
never yet visited her. 

“ Strange ! ” perhaps you will say, “ this rush of impulse 
towards a course that might have seemed the most repug- 
nant to her present state of mind, and in only the second 
night of her sadness ! ” 

Yes, the actions of a little, trivial soul like Hetty’s, strug- 
gling amidst the serious, sad destinies of a human being, 
are strange. So are the motions of a little vessel without 
ballast tossed about on a stormy sea. How pretty it looked 
with its party-coloured sail in the sunlight, moored in the 
quiet bay ! 

“ Let that man bear the loss who loosed it from its moor- 
ings.” 

But that will not save the vessel, — the pretty thing that 
might have been a lasting joy. 


CHAPTER XXXIL 

MRS. POYSER “ HAS HER SAY OUT.” 



HE next Saturday evening there was much excited 


A discussion at the Donnithorne Arms concerning an 
incident which had occurred that very day, — no less than a 
second appearance of the smart man in top-boots, said by 
some to be a mere farmer in treaty for the Chase Farm, by 
others to be the future steward ; but by Mr. Casson himself, 
the personal witness to the stranger’s visit, pronounced 


344 


MRS. POYSER “ HAS HER SAY OUT " 

contemptuously to be nothing better than a bailiff, sue 
Satchell had been before him. No one had thought of de 
ing Mr. Casson’s testimony to the fact that he had seen ti. 
stranger ; nevertheless he proffered various corroborating 
circumstances. 

“ I see him myself,” he said ; I see him coming along by 
the Crab-tree meadow on a bald-faced boss. I ’d just been 
C hev a pint, — it was half-after ten i’ the forenoon, when I 
hev my pint as reg’lar as the clock, — and I says to 
Knowles, as druv up with his wagon, ‘ You ’ll get a bit o’ 
barley to-day, Knowles,’ I says, ‘ if you look about you 
and then I went round by the rick-yard, and towart the 
Treddles’on road ; and just as I come up by the big ash- 
tree, I see the man i’ top-boots coming along on a bald- 
faced hoss, — I wish I may never stir if I did n’t. And I 
stood still till he come up, and I says, ' Good-morning, sir,’ 
I says, for I wanted to hear the turn of his tongue, as I 
might know whether he was a this-countryman ; so I says, 
' Good-morning, sir ; it ’ll ’old hup for the barley this morn- 
ing, I think. There ’ll be a bit got hin, if we ’ve good luck.’ 
And he says, ‘ Eh, ye may be raight, there ’s noo tailin’,’ he 
says ; and I knowed by that ” — here Mr. Casson gave a 
wink — as he did n’t come from a hundred mile off. I 
dare say he ’d think me a hodd talker, as you Loamshire 
folks allays does hany one as talks the right language.” 

The right language ! ” said Bartle Massey, contemptu- 
ously. “ You ’re about as near the right language as a 
pig’s squeaking is like a tune played on a key-bugle.” 

Well, I don’t know,” answered Mr. Casson, with an 
angry smile. “ I should think a man as has lived among 
the gentry from a b’y is likely to know what ’s the right 
language pretty nigh as well as a schoolmaster.” 

‘‘ Ay, ay, man,” said Bartle, with a tone of sarcastic con- 
solation, “ you talk the right language for you. When Mike 
Holdsworth’s goat says ba-a-a, it ’s all right, — it ’ud be un- 
natural for it to make any other noise.” 

The rest of the party being Loamshire men, Mr. Casson 
had the laugh strongly against him, and wisely fell back on 
the previous question, which, far from being exhausted in 
a single evening, was renewed in the churchyard, before 

345 


ADAM BEDE 


xe, the next day, with the fresh interest conferred on 
news when there is a fresh person to hear it; and that 
resh hearer was Martin Poyser, who, as his wife said, 
never went boozin’ with that set at Casson’s, a-sittin’ 
soakin’-in drink, and looking as wise as a lot o’ cod-fish wi’ 
red faces.” 

It was probably owing to the conversation she had had 
with her husband on their way from church, concerning 
this problematic stranger, that Mrs. Poyser’s thoughts im- 
mediately reverted to him when, a day or two afterwards, 
as she was standing at the house-door with her knitting, in 
that eager leisure which came to her when the afternoon 
cleaning was done, she saw the old Squire enter the yard 
on his black pony, followed by John the groom. She always 
cited it afterwards as a case of prevision, which really had 
something more in it than her own remarkable penetration, 
that the moment she set eyes on the Squire, she said to her- 
self : ‘‘ I shouldna wonder if he ’s come about that man as 
is a-going to take the Chase Farm, wanting Poyser to do 
something for him without pay. But Poyser ’s a fool if he 
does.” 

Something unwonted must clearly be in the wind, for the 
old Squire’s visits to his tenantry were rare ; and though 
Mrs. Poyser had during the last twelvemonth recited many 
imaginary speeches, meaning even more than met the ear, 
which she was quite determined to make to him the next 
time he appeared within the gates of the Hall Farm, the 
speeches had always remained imaginary. 

“ Good-day, Mrs. Poyser,” said the old Squire, peering at 
her with his short-sighted eyes, — a mode of looking at her 
which, as Mrs. Poyser observed, allays aggravated her ; 
it was as if you was a insect, and he was going to dab his 
finger-nail on you.” 

However she said, “ Your servant, sir,” and courtesied 
with an air of perfect deference as she advanced towards 
him ; she was not the woman to misbehave towards her bet- 
ters, and fly in the face of the catechism, without severe 
provocation. 

Is your husband at home, Mrs. Poyser ? ” 

346 


MRS. POYSER HAS HER SAY OUT 


“ Yes, sir; he ’s only i' the rick-yard. I ’ll send for him in 
n minute, if you ’ll please to get down and step in.” 

Thank you ; I will do so. I want to consult him 
about a little matter ; but you are quite as much concerned 
in it, if not more. I must have your opinion too.” 

Hetty, run and tell your uncle to come in,” said Mrs. 
Poyser, as they entered the house, and the old gentleman 
bowed low in answer to Hetty’s courtesy ; while Totty, con- 
scious of a pinafore stained with gooseberry jam, stood hid- 
ing her face against the clock, and peeping round furtively. 

“ What a fine old kitchen this is ! ” said Mr. Donnithorne, 
looking round admiringly. He always spoke in the same 
deliberate, well-chiselled, polite way, whether his words 
were sugary or venomous. “ And you keep it so exquisitely 
clean, Mrs. Poyser. I like these premises, do you know, 
beyond any on the estate.” 

“ Well, sir, since you ’re fond of ’em, I should be glad if 
you ’d let a bit o’ repairs be done to ’em, for the boarding ’s 
i’ that state as we ’re like to be eaten up wi’ rats and mice ; 
and the cellar, you may stan’ up to your knees i’ water in ’t, 
if you like to go down ; but perhaps you ’d rather believe 
my words. Won’t you please to sit down, sir?” 

Not yet ; I must see your dairy. I have not seen it for 
years, and I hear on all hands about your fine cheese and 
butter,” said the Squire, looking politely unconscious that 
there could be any question on which he and Mrs. Poyser 
might happen to disagree. I think I see the door open, 
there ; you must not be surprised if I cast a covetous eye on 
your cream and butter. I don’t expect that Mrs. Satchell’s 
cream and butter will bear comparison with yours.” 

I can’t say, sir, I ’m sure. It ’s seldom 1 see other folks’s 
butter, though there *s some on it as one ’s no need to see, — 
the smell ’s enough.” 

“ Ah, now this I like,” said Mr. Donnithorne, looking 
round at the damp temple of cleanliness, but keeping near 
the door. “ I ’m sure I should like my breakfast better if I 
knew the butter and cream came from this dairy. Thank 
you, that really is a pleasant sight. Unfortunately, my 
slight tendency to rheumatism makes me afraid of damp; 
I ’ll sit down in your comfortable kitchen. Ah, Poyser, how 

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ADAM BEDE 


do you do ? In the midst of business, I see, as usual. I Ve 
been looking at your wife’s beautiful dairy, — the best man- 
ager in the parish, is she not ? ’’ 

Mr. Poyser had just entered in shirt-sleeves and open 
waistcoat, with a face a shade redder than usual, from the 
exertion of “ pitching.” As he stood, red, rotund, and radi- 
ant, before the small, wiry, cool old gentleman, he looked 
like a prize apple by the side of a withered crab. 

“ Will you please to take this chair, sir? ” he said, lifting 
his father's arm-chair forward a little ; “ you '11 find it easy.” 

“ No, thank you, I never sit in easy-chairs,” said the old 
gentleman, seating himself on a small chair near the door. 
“ Do you know, Mrs. Poyser, — sit down, pray, both of you, 
— I Ve been far from contented, for some time, with Mrs. 
Satchell’s dairy management. I think she has not a good 
method, as you have.” 

“ Indeed, sir, I can’t speak to that,” said Mrs. Poyser, in 
a hard voice, rolling and unrolling her knitting, and looking 
icily out of the window, as she continued to stand opposite 
the Squire. Poyser might sit down if he liked, she thought ; 
she was n’t going to sit down, as if she ’d give in to any such 
smooth-tongued palaver. Mr. Poyser, who looked and felt 
the reverse of icy, did sit down in his three-cornered chair. 

“ And now, Poyser, as Satchell is laid up, I am intending 
to let the Chase Farm to a respectable tenant. I ’m tired 
of having a farm on my own hands, — nothing is made the 
best of in such cases, as you know. A satisfactory bailiff is 
hard to find ; and I think you and I, Poyser, and your ex- 
cellent wife here, can enter into a little arrangement in con- 
sequence, which will be to our mutual advantage.” 

“ Oh,” said Mr. Poyser, with a good-natured blankness 
of imagination as to the nature of the arrangement. 

'' If I ’m called upon to speak, sir,” said Mrs. Poyser, after 
glancing at her husband with pity at his softness, ‘‘ you 
know better than me ; but I don’t see what the Chase Farm 
is t’ us, — we ’ve cumber enough wi’ our own farm. Not 
but what I ’m glad to hear o’ anybody respectable coming 
into the parish ; there ’s some as ha’ been brought in as 
has n’t been looked on i’ that character.” 

You ’re likely to find Mr. Thurle an excellent neigh- 

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MRS. POYSER “ HAS HER SAY OUT ” 


hour, I assure you, — such a one as you will feel glad to have 
accommodated by the little plan I 'm going to mention ; 
especially as I hope you will find it as much to your own ad- 
vantage as his.'^ 

“ Indeed, sir, if it ’s anything t’ our advantage, it ’ll be 
the first offer o’ the sort I ’ve beared on. It ’s them as take 
advantage that get advantage i’ this world, / think ; folks 
have to wait long enough afore it ’s brought to ’em.” 

“ The fact is, Poyser,” said the Squire, ignoring Mrs. 
Poyser’s theory of worldly prosperity, there is too much 
dairy land and too little plough land on the Chase Farm to 
suit Thurle’s purpose, — indeed, he will only take the farm 
on condition of some change in it ; his wife, it appears, is not 
a clever dairy-woman, like yours. Now, the plan I ’m 
thinking of is to effect a little exchange. If you were to 
have the Hollow Pastures, you might increase your dairy, 
which must be so profitable under your wife’s management ; 
and I should request you, Mrs. Poyser, to supply my house 
with milk, cream, and butter at the market prices. On the 
other hand, Poyser, you might let Thurle have the Lower 
and Upper Ridges, which really, with our wet seasons, 
would be a good riddance for you. There is much less risk 
in dairy land than corn land.” 

Mr. Poyser was leaning forward, with his elbows on his 
knees, his head on one side, and his mouth screwed up, — 
apparently absorbed in making the tips of his fingers meet 
so as to represent with perfect accuracy the ribs of a ship. 
He was much too acute a man not to see through the whole 
business, and to foresee perfectly what would be his wife’s 
view of the subject ; but he disliked giving unpleasant 
answers. Unless it was on a point of farming practice, he 
would rather give up than have a quarrel, any day; and, 
after all, it mattered more to his wife than to him. So, after 
a few moments’ silence, he looked up at her, and said mildly, 
“ What dost say ? ” 

Mrs. Poyser had had her eyes fixed on her husband with 
cold severity during his silence ; but now she turned away her 
head with a toss, looked icily at the opposite roof of the 
cow-shed, and spearing her knitting together with the loose 
pin, held it firmly between her clasped hands. 

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ADAM BEDE 


Say ? Why, I say you may do as you like about giving 
up any o’ your corn land afore your lease is up, which it 
won’t be for a year come next Michaelmas, but I ’ll not con- 
sent to take more dairy work into my hands, either for love 
or money ; and there ’s nayther love nor money here, as I 
can see, on’y other folks’s love o’ theirselves, and the money 
as is to go into other folks’s pockets. I know there ’s them 
as is born t’ own the land, and them as is born to sweat on 
’t,” — here Mrs. Poyser paused to gasp a little, — and I 
know it ’s christened folks’s duty to submit to their betters 
as fur as flesh and blood ’ull bear it ; but I ’ll not make a 
martyr o’ myself, and wear myself to skin and bone, and 
worret myself as if I was a churn wi’ butter a-comin in ’t, 
for no landlord in England, not if he was King George him- 
self.” 

No, no, my dear Mrs. Poyser, certainly not,” said the 
Squire, still confident in his own powers of persuasion, “ you 
must not overwork yourself ; but don’t you think your work 
will rather be lessened than increased in this way? There 
is so much milk required at the Abbey, that you will have 
little increase of cheese and butter making from the addi- 
tion to your dairy ; and I believe selling the milk is the most 
profitable way of disposing of dairy produce, is it not ? ” 

“ Ay, that ’s true,” said Mr. Poyser, unable to repress an 
opinion on a question of farming profits, and forgetting 
that it was not in this case a purely abstract question. 

“ I dare say,” said Mrs. Poyser bitterly, turning her head 
half-way towards her husband, and looking at the vacant 
arm-chair, — I dare say it ’s true for men as sit i’ th’ chim- 
ney-corner and make believe as everything ’s cut wi’ ins an’ 
outs to fit int’ everything else. If you could make a pud- 
ding wi’ thinking o’ the batter, it ’ud be easy getting dinner. 
How do I know whether the milk ’ull be wanted constant? 
What ’s to make me sure as the house won’t be put o’ board 
wage afore we ’re many months older, and then I may have 
to lie awake o’ nights wi’ twenty gallons o’ milk on my 
mind, — and Dingall ’ull take no more butter, let alone 
paying for it ; and we must fat pigs till we ’re obliged to beg 
the butcher on our knees to buy ’em, and lose half of ’em 
wi’ the measles. And there ’s the fetching and carrying, as 

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MRS. POYSER “ HAS HER SAY OUT 


’ud be welly half a day’s work for a man an’ boss, — that ’s 
to be took out o’ the profits, I reckon ? But there ’s folks 
’ud hold a sieve under the pump and expect to carry away 
the water.” 

“ That difficulty — about the fetching and carrying — 
you will not have, Mrs. Poyser,” said the Squire, who 
thought that this entrance into particulars indicated a dis- 
tant inclination to compromise on Mrs. Poyser’s part, — 
Bethell will do that regularly with the cart and pony.” 

“ Oh, sir, begging your pardon, I ’ve never been used t’ 
having gentlefolks’s servants coming about my back places, 
a-making love to both the gells at once, and keeping ’em 
with their hands on their hips listening to all manner o’ 
gossip when they should be down on their knees a-scouring. 
If we ’re to go to ruin, it shanna be wi’ having our back- 
kitchen turned into a public.” 

“ Well, Poyser,” said the Squire, shifting his tactics, and 
looking as if he thought Mrs. Poyser had suddenly with- 
drawn from the proceedings and left the room, “ you can 
turn the Hollows into feeding-land. I can easily make 
another arrangement about supplying my house. And I shall 
not forget your readiness to accommodate your land- 
lord as well as a neighbour. I know you will be glad to 
have your lease renewed for three years, when the present 
one expires; otherwise, I dare say, Thurle, who is a man of 
some capital, would be glad to take both the farms, as they 
could be worked so well together. But I don’t want to part 
with an old tenant like you.” 

To be thrust out of the discussion in this way would have 
been enough to complete Mrs. Poyser’s exasperation, even 
without the final threat. Her husband, really alarmed at 
the possibility of their leaving the old place where he had 
been bred and born, — for he believed the old Squire had 
small spite enough for anything, — was beginning a mild 
remonstrance explanatory of the inconvenience he should 
find in having to buy and sell more stock, with — 

“ Well, sir, I think as it ’s rether hard, — ” when Mrs. Poy- 
ser burst in with the desperate determination to have her 
say out this once, though it were to rain notices to quit, 
and the only shelter were the workhouse. 

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ADAM BEDE 


“ Then, sir, if I may speak, — as, for all I ’m a woman, 
and there ’s folks as thinks a woman ’s fool enough to stan’ 
by an’ look on while the men sign her soul away, I Ve a 
right to speak, for I make one quarter o’ the rent, and save 
another quarter, — I say, if Mr. Thurle ’s so ready to take 
farms under you, it ’s a pity but what he should take this, 
and see if he likes to live in a house wi’ all the plagues o’ 
Egypt in ’t, — wi’ the cellar full o’ water, and frogs and 
toads hoppin’ up the steps by dozens, — and the floors rot- 
ten, and the rats and mice gnawing every bit o’ cheese, and 
runnin’ over our heads as we lie i’ bed till we expect ’em to 
eat us up alive, — as it ’s a mercy they hanna eat the chil- 
dren long ago. I should like to see if there ’s another tenant 
besides Poyser as ’ud put up wi’ never having a bit o’ re- 
pairs done till a place tumbles down, — and not then, on’y 
wi’ begging and praying, and having to pay half, — and 
being strung up wi’ the rent as it ’s much if he gets enough 
out o’ the land to pay, for all he ’s put his own money into 
the ground beforehand. See if you ’ll get a stranger to lead 
such a life here as that : a maggot must be born i’ the rot- 
ten cheese to like it, I reckon. You may run away from my 
words, sir,” continued Mrs. Poyser, following the old Squire 
beyond the door, — for after the first moments of stunned 
surprise he had got up, and, waving his hand towards her 
with a smile, had walked out towards his pony. But it was 
impossible for him to get away immediately ; for John was 
walking the pony up and down the yard, and was some dis- 
tance from the causeway when his master beckoned. 

“ You may run away from my words, sir, and you may 
go spinnin’ underhand ways o’ doing us a mischief, for 
you ’ve got Old Harry to your friend, though nobody else 
is ; but I tell you for once as we ’re not dumb creatures to 
be abused and made money on by them as ha’ got the lash 
i* their hands, for want o’ knowing how t’ undo the tackle. 
An’ if I ’m the only one as speaks my mind, there ’s plenty 
o’ the same way o’ thinking i’ this parish and the next to ’t, 
for your name ’s no better than a brimstone match in every- 
body’s nose, — if it isna two-three old folks as you think o’ 
saving your soul by giving ’em a bit o’ flannel and a drop o’ 
porridge. An’ you may be right i’ thinking it ’ll take but 

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MRS. POYSER “ HAS HER SAY OUT 


little to save your soul, for it ’ll be the smallest savin’ y’ iver 
made, wi’ all your scrapin’.” 

There are occasions on which two servant-girls and a 
wagoner may be a formidable audience; and as the Squire 
rode away on his black pony, even the gift of short-sighted- 
ness did not prevent him from being aware that Molly and 
Nancy and Tim were grinning not far from him. Perhaps 
he suspected that sour old John was grinning behind him, 
— which was also the fact. Meanwhile the bull-dog, the 
black-and-tan terrier, Alick’s sheep-dog, and the gander 
hissing at a safe distance from the pony’s heels carried out 
the idea of Mrs. Poyser’s solo in an impressive quartet. 

Mrs. Poyser, however, had no sooner seen the pony move 
off than she turned round, gave the two hilarious damsels a 
look which drove them into the back-kitchen, and, unspear- 
ing her knitting, began to knit again with her usual rapid- 
ity, as she entered the house. 

“ Thee ’st done it now,” said Mr. Poyser, a little alarmed 
and uneasy, but not without some triumphant amusement 
at his wife’s outbreak. 

“ Yes, I know I ’ve done it,” said Mrs. Poyser; “ but I ’ve 
had my say out, and I shall be th’ easier for ’t all my life. 
There ’s no pleasure i’ living, if you ’re to be corked up for- 
ever, and only dribble your mind out by the sly, like a leaky 
barrel. I sha’n’t repent saying what I think, if I live to be 
as old as th’ old Squire ; and there ’s little likelihoods, for it 
seems as if them as are n’t wanted here are th’ only folks 
as are n’t wanted i‘ th’ other world.” 

“ But thee wutna like moving from th’ old place, this 
Michaelmas twelvemonth,” said Mr. Poyser, “ and going 
into a strange parish, where thee know’st nobody. It ’ll be 
hard upon us both, and upo’ father too.” 

Eh, it ’s no use worreting ; there ’s plenty o’ things may 
happen between this and Michaelmas twelvemonth. The 
Captain may be master afore then, for what we know,” said 
Mrs. Poyser, inclined to take an unusually hopeful view of 
an embarrassment which had been brought about by her 
own merit, and not by other people’s fault. 

I ’m none for worreting,” said Mr. Poyser, rising from 
his three-cornered chair, and walking slowly towards the 

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ADAM BEDE 


door ; “ but I should be loath to leave th’ old place, and the 
parish where I was bred and born, and father afore me. We 
should leave our roots behind us, I doubt, and never thrive 
again.^' 


CHAPTER XXXIII. 

MORE LINKS. 

T he barley was all carried at last, and the harvest sup- 
pers went by without waiting for the dismal black 
crop of beans. The apples and nuts were gathered and 
stored; the scent of whey departed from the farmhouses, 
and the scent of brewing came in its stead. The woods be- 
hind the Chase, and all the hedgerow trees took on a solemn 
splendour under the dark, low-hanging skies. Michaelmas 
was come, with its fragrant basketfuls of purple damsons, 
and its paler purple daisies, and its lads and lassies leaving 
or seeking service, and winding along between the yellow 
hedges, with their bundles under their arms. But though 
Michaelmas was come, Mr. Thurle, that desirable tenant, 
did not come to the Chase Farm, and the old Squire, after 
all, had been obliged to put in a new bailiff. It was known 
throughout the two parishes that the Squire’s plan had 
been frustrated because the Poysers had refused to be 
“ put upon ; ” and Mrs. Poyser’s outbreak was discussed in 
all the farmhouses with a zest which was only heightened 
by frequent repetition. The news that Bony ” was come 
back from Egypt was comparatively insipid, and the repulse 
of the French in Italy was nothing to Mrs. Poyser’s repulse 
of the old Squire. Mr. Irwine had heard a version of it in 
every parishioner’s house, with the one exception of the 
Chase. But since he had always, with marvellous skill, 
avoided any quarrel with Mr. Donnithorne, he could not 
allow himself the pleasure of laughing at the old gentle- 
man’s discomfiture with any one besides his mother, who 
declared that if she were rich she should like to allow Mrs. 
Poyser a pension for life, and wanted to invite her to the 

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parsonage, that she might hear an account of the scene fro* 
Mrs. Poyser’s own lips. 

“ No, no, mother,” said Mr. Irwine ; “ it was a little bit of 
irregular justice on Mrs. Poyser’s part, but a magistrate like 
me must not countenance irregular justice. There must be 
no report spread that I have taken notice of the quarrel, 
else I shall lose the little good influence I have over the old 
man.” 

“ Well, I like that woman even better than her cream- 
cheeses,” said Mrs. Irwine. “ She has the spirit of three 
men, with that pale face of hers; and she says such sharp 
things too.” 

“ Sharp ! yes, her tongue is like a new-set razor. She 's 
quite original in her talk, too ; one of those untaught wits 
that help to stock a country with proverbs. I told you that 
capital thing I heard her say about Craig, — that he was 
like a cock, who thought the sun had risen to hear him 
crow. Now, that ’s an ^sop’s fable in a sentence.” 

“ But it will be a bad business if the old gentleman turns 
them out of the farm next Michaelmas, eh ? ” said Mrs. Ir- 
wine. 

“ Oh, that must not be ; and Poyser is such a good ten- 
ant, that Donnithorne is likely to think twice, and digest 
his spleen rather than turn them out. But if he should give 
them notice at Lady Day, Arthur and I must move heaven 
and earth to mollify him. Such old parishioners as they are 
must not go.” 

“ Ah, there ’s no knowing what may happen before Lady 
Day,” said Mrs. Irwine. “ It struck me on Arthur’s birth- 
day that the old man was a little shaken ; he ’s eighty-three, 
you know. It ’s really an unconscionable age. It ’s only 
women who have a right to live as long as that.” 

“ When they ’ve got old-bachelor sons who would be for- 
lorn without them,” said Mr. Irwine, laughing, and kissing 
his mother’s hand. 

Mrs. Poyser, too, met her husband’s occasional forebod- 
ings of a notice to quit with There ’s no knowing what may 
happen before Lady Day,” — one of those undeniable gen- 
eral propositions which are usually intended to convey a 
particular meaning very far from undeniable. But it is really 

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ADAM BEDE 


/O hard upon human nature that it should be held a crim- 
inal offence to imagine the death even of the king when 
he is turned eighty-three. It is not to be believed that any 
but the dullest Britons can be good subjects under that hard 
condition. 

Apart from this foreboding, things went on much as usual 
in the Poyser household. Mrs. Poyser thought she noticed 
a surprising improvement in Pletty. To be sure, the girl got 
“ closer tempered, and sometimes she seemed as if there ’d 
be no drawing a word from her with cart-ropes ; ’’ but she 
thought much less about her dress, and went after the work 
quite eagerly, without any telling. And it was wonderful 
how she never wanted to go out now, — indeed, could hardly 
be persuaded to go ; and she bore her aunt’s putting a stop 
to her weekly lesson in fine-work at the Chase without the 
least grumbling or pouting. It must be, after all, that she 
had set her heart on Adam at last ; and her sudden freak of 
wanting to be a lady’s-maid must have been caused by some 
little pique or misunderstanding between them, which had 
passed by. For whenever Adam came to the Hall Farm, 
Hetty seemed to be in better spirits, and to talk more than 
at other times, though she was almost sullen when Mr. 
Craig or any other admirer happened to pay a visit there. 

Adam himself watched her at first with trembling anxi- 
ety, which gave way to surprise and delicious hope. Five 
days after delivering Arthur’s letter, he had ventured to go 
to the Hall Farm again, — not without dread lest the sight 
of him might be painful to her. She was not in the house- 
place when he entered, and he sat talking to Mr. and Mrs. 
Poyser for a few minutes with a heavy fear on his heart that 
they might presently tell him Hetty was ill. But by and by 
there came a light step that he knew, and when Mrs. Poyser 
said, “ Come, Hetty, where have you been ? ” Adam was 
obliged to turn round, though he was afraid to see the 
changed look there must be in her face. He almost started 
when he saw her smiling as if she were pleased to see him, — 
looking the same as ever at a first glance, only that she had 
her cap on, which he had never seen her in before when he 
came of an evening. Still, when he looked at her again and 
again as she moved about or sat at her work, there was a 

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change : the cheeks were as pink as ever, and she smiled as 
much as she had ever done of late; but there was some- 
thing different in her eyes, in the expression of her face, 
in all her movements, Adam thought, — something harder, 
older, less childlike. Poor thing ! he said to himself, 
“ that ’s allays likely. It ’s because she ’s had her first heart- 
ache. But she ’s got a spirit to bear up under it. Thank 
God for that.” 

As the weeks went by, and he saw her always looking 
pleased to see him, — turning up her lovely face towards 
him as if she meant him to understand that she was glad for 
him to come, — and going about her work in the same 
equable way, making no sign of sorrow, he began to believe 
that her feeling towards Arthur must have been much 
slighter than he had imagined in his first indignation and 
alarm, and that she had been able to think of her girlish 
fancy that Arthur was in love with her and would marry 
her as a folly of which she was timely cured. And it per- 
haps was as he had sometimes in his more cheerful mo- 
ments hoped it would be, — her heart was really turning 
with all the more warmth towards the man she knew to have 
a serious love for her. 

Possibly you think that Adam was not at all sagacious 
in his interpretations, and that it was altogether extremely 
unbecoming in a sensible man to behave as he did, — falling 
in love with a girl who really had nothing more than her 
beauty to recommend her, attributing imaginary virtues to 
her, and even condescending to cleave to her after she had 
fallen in love with another man, waiting for her kind looks 
as a patient, trembling dog waits for his master's eye to be 
turned upon him. But in so complex a thing as human 
nature, we must consider, it is hard to find rules without 
exceptions. Of course, I know that, as a rule, sensible men 
fall in love with the most sensible women of their acquaint- 
ance, see through all the pretty deceits of coquettish beauty, 
never imagine themselves loved when they are not loved, 
cease loving on all proper occasions, and marry the woman 
most fitted for them in every respect, — indeed, so as to 
compel the approbation of all the maiden ladies in their 
neighbourhood. But even to this rule an exception will 

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ADAM BEDE 


occur now and then in the lapse of centuries, and my friend 
Adam was one. For my own part, however, I respect him 
none the less; nay, I think the deep love he had for that 
sweet, rounded, blossom-like, dark-eyed Hetty, of whose 
inward self he was really very ignorant, came out of the very 
strength of his nature, and not out of any inconsistent weak- 
ness. Is it any weakness, pray, to be wrought on by ex- 
quisite music, — to feel its wondrous harmonies searching 
the subtlest windings of your soul, the delicate fibres of life 
where no memory can penetrate, and binding together your 
whole being past and present in one unspeakable vibration ; 
melting you in one moment with all the tenderness, all the 
love that has been scattered through the toilsome years; 
concentrating in one emotion of heroic courage or resigna- 
tion all the hard-learnt lessons of self-renouncing sympathy ; 
blending your present joy with past sorrow, and your pres- 
ent sorrow with all your past joy? If not, then neither is 
it a weakness to be so wrought upon by the exquisite curves 
of a woman’s cheek and neck and arms, by the liquid depths 
of her beseeching eyes, or the sweet childish pout of her 
lips. For the beauty of a lovely woman is like music: what 
can one say more? Beauty has an expression beyond and 
far above the one woman’s soul that it clothes, as the words 
of genius have a wider meaning than the thought that 
prompted them : it is more than a woman’s love that moves 
us in a woman’s eyes, — it seems to be a far-off mighty love 
that has come near to us, and made speech for itself there ; 
the rounded neck, the dimpled arm, move us by something 
more than their prettiness, — by their close kinship with 
all we have known of tenderness and peace. The noblest 
nature sees the most of this impersonal expression in beauty 
(it is needless to say that there are gentlemen with whiskers 
dyed and undyed who see none of it whatever) ; and for this 
reason the noblest nature is often the most blinded to the 
character of the one woman’s soul that the beauty clothes. 
Whence, I fear, the tragedy of human life is likely to con- 
tinue for a long time to come, in spite of mental philosophers 
who are ready with the best receipts for avoiding all mis- 
takes of the kind. 

Our good Adam had no fine words into which he could 

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put his feeling for Hetty : he could not disguise mystery in 
this way with the appearance of knowledge; he called his 
love frankly a mystery, as you have heard him. He only 
knew that the sight and memory of her moved him deeply, 
touching the spring of all love and tenderness, all faith and 
courage within him. How could he imagine narrowness, 
selfishness, hardness in her? He created the mind he believed 
in out of his own, which was large, unselfish, tender. 

The hopes he felt about Hetty softened a little his feel- 
ing towards Arthur. Surely his attentions to Hetty must 
have been of a slight kind ; they were altogether wrong, and 
such as no man in Arthur’s position ought to have allowed 
himself, but they must have had an air of playfulness about 
them, which had probably blinded him to their danger, and 
had prevented them from laying any strong hold on Hetty’s 
heart. As the new promise of happiness rose for Adam, his 
indignation and jealousy began to die out. Hetty was not 
made unhappy ; he almost believed that she liked him best ; 
and the thought sometimes crossed his mind that the friend- 
ship which had once seemed dead forever might revive in 
the days to come, and he would not have to say “ good-by ” 
to the grand old woods, but would like them better because 
they were Arthur’s. For this new promise of happiness, 
following so quickly on the shock of pain, had an intoxicat- 
ing effect on the sober Adam, who had all his life been used 
to much hardship and moderate hope. Was he really go- 
ing to have an easy lot, after all ? It seemed so ; for at the 
beginning of November Jonathan Burge, finding it impos- 
sible to replace Adam, had at last made up his mind to offer 
him a share in the business, without further condition than 
that he should continue to give his energies to it, and re- 
nounce all thought of having a separate business of his o-wn. 
Son-in-law or no son-in-law, Adam had made himself too 
necessary to be parted with ; and his headwork was so much 
more important to Burge than his skill in handicraft, that 
his having the management of the woods made little dif- 
ference in the value of his services ; and as to the bargains 
about the Squire’s timber, it would be easy to call in a third 
person. Adam saw here an opening into a broadening path 
of prosperous work, such as he had thought of with ambi- 

359 


ADAM BEDE 


tious longing ever since he was a lad; he might come to 
build a bridge, or a town-hall, or a factory, for he had al- 
ways said to himself that Jonathan Burge’s building busi- 
ness was like an acorn, which might be the mother of a 
great tree. So he gave his hand to Burge on that bargain, 
and went home with his mind full of happy visions, in which 
(my refined reader will perhaps be shocked when I say it) the 
image of Hetty hovered, and smiled over plans for season- 
ing timber at a trifling expense, calculations as to the cheap- 
ening of bricks per thousand by water-carriage, and a fa- 
vourite scheme for the strengthening of roofs and walls with 
a peculiar form of iron girder. What then? Adam’s en- 
thusiasm lay in these things; and our love is inwrought in 
our enthusiasm as electricity is inwrought in the air, exalt- 
ing its power by a subtle presence. 

Adam would be able to take a separate house now, and 
provide for his mother in the old one; his prospects would 
justify his marrying very soon, and if Dinah consented to 
have Seth, their mother would perhaps be more contented 
to live apart from Adam. But he told himself that he would 
not be hasty, — he would not try Hetty’s feeling for him 
until it had had time to grow strong and firm. However, 
to-morrow, after church, he would go to the Hall Farm, and 
tell them the news. Mr. Poyser, he knew, would like it bet- 
ter than a five-pound note, and he should see if Hetty’s 
eyes brightened at it. The months would be short with all 
he had to fill his mind, and this foolish eagerness which had 
come over him of late must not hurry him into any prema- 
ture words. Yet when he got home and told his mother the 
good news, and ate his supper, while she sat by almost cry- 
ing for joy, and wanting him to eat twice as much as usual 
because of this good luck, he could not help preparing her 
gently for the coming change, by talking of the old house 
being too small for them all to go on living in it always. 


360 


THE BETROTHAL 


CHAPTER XXXIV. 

THE BETROTHAL. 

I T was a dry Sunday, and really a pleasant day for the 2d 
of November. There was no sunshine, but the clouds 
were high, and the wind was so still that the yellow leaves 
which fluttered down from the hedgerow elms must have 
fallen from pure decay. Nevertheless, Mrs. Poyser did not 
go to church, for she had taken a cold too serious to be 
neglected; only two winters ago she had been laid up for 
weeks with a cold ; and since his wife did not go to church, 
Mr. Poyser considered that on the whole it would be as well 
for him to stay away too and “ keep her company.” He 
could perhaps have given no precise form to the reasons that 
determined this conclusion ; but it is well known to all ex- 
perienced minds that our firmest convictions are often de- 
pendent on subtle impressions for which words are quite too 
coarse a medium. However it was, no one from the Poyser 
family went to church that afternoon except Hetty and the 
boys ; yet Adam was bold enough to join them after church, 
and say that he would walk home with them, though all the 
way through the village he appeared to be chiefly occupied 
with Marty and Tommy, telling them about the squirrels in 
Binton Coppice, and promising to take them there some day. 
But when they came to the fields he said to the boy^, Now, 
then, which is the stoutest walker? Him as gets to th' 
home-gate first shall be the first to go with me to Binton 
Coppice on the donkey. But Tommy must have the start up 
to the next stile, because he ’s the smallest.” 

Adam had never behaved so much like a determined lover 
before. As soon as the boys had both set off, he looked 
down at Hetty, and said, “ Won’t you hang on my arm, 
Hetty ? ” in a pleading tone, as if he had already asked her 
and she had refused. Hetty looked up at him smilingly, and 
put her round arm through his in a moment. It was noth- 
ing to her, — putting her arm through Adam’s ; but she 
knew he cared a great deal about having her arm through 
his, and she wished him to care. Her heart beat no faster, 

361 


ADAM BEDE 


^nd she looked at the half-bare hedgerows and the ploughed 
field with the same sense of oppressive dulness as before. But 
Adam scarcely felt that he was walking ; he thought Hetty 
must know that he was pressing her arm a little, — a very 
little ; words rushed to his lips that he dared not utter, — 
that he had made up his mind not to utter yet; and so he 
was silent for the length of that field. The calm patience 
with which he had once waited for Hetty’s love, content only 
with her presence and the thought of the future, had for- 
saken him since that terrible shock nearly three months ago. 
The agitations of jealousy had given a new restlessness to 
his passion, — had made fear and uncertainty too hard al- 
most to bear. But though he might not speak to Hetty of 
his love, he would tell her about his new prospects, and see 
if she would be pleased. So when he was enough master of 
himself to talk, he said, — 

“ I ’m going to tell your uncle some news that ’ll sur- 
prise him, Hetty ; and I think he ’ll be glad to hear it too.” 

“ What ’s that ? ” Hetty said indifferently. 

“ Why, Mr. Burge has offered me a share in his business, 
and I ’m going to take it.” 

There was a change in Hetty’s face, certainly not pro- 
duced by any agreeable impression from this news. In fact, 
she felt a momentary annoyance and alarm ; for she had so 
often heard it hinted by her uncle that Adam might have 
Mary Burge and a share in the business any day if he liked, 
that she associated the two objects now, and the thought 
immediately occurred that perhaps Adam had given her up 
because of what had happened lately, and had turned to- 
wards Mary Burge. With that thought, and before she had 
time to remember any reasons why it could not be true, 
came a new sense of forsakenness and disappointment, — the 
one thing, the one person, her mind had rested on in its dull 
weariness had slipped away from her ; and peevish misery 
filled her eyes with tears. She was looking on the ground ; 
but Adam saw her face, saw the tears, and before he had 
finished saying, “ Hetty, dear Hetty, what are you crying 
for ? ” his eager, rapid thought had flown through all the 
causes conceivable to him, and had at last alighted on half 
the true one. Hetty thought he was going to mafry Mary 

362 


THE BETROTHAL 


Burge, — she did n't like him to marry, — perhaps she 
didn't like him to marry any one but herself? All caution 
was swept away, — all reason for it was gone, and Adam 
could feel nothing but trembling joy. He leaned towards 
her and took her hand, as he said, — 

“ I could afford to be married now, Hetty, — I could 
make a wife comfortable ; but I shall never want to be mar- 
ried if you won’t have me." 

Hetty looked up at him, and smiled through her tears as 
she had done to Arthur that first evening in the wood, when 
she had thought he was not coming, and yet he came. It 
was a feebler relief, a feebler triumph, she felt now ; but the 
great dark eyes and the sweet lips were as beautiful as ever, 
perhaps more beautiful, for there was a more luxuriant 
womanliness about Hetty of late. Adam could hardly be- 
lieve in the happiness of that moment. His right hand held 
her left, and he pressed her arm close against his heart as he 
leaned down towards her. 

“ Do you really love me, Hetty ? Will you be my own 
wife, to love and take care of as long as I live ? " 

Hetty did not speak ; but Adam's face was very close to 
hers, and she put up her round cheek against his, like a 
kitten. She wanted to be caressed, — she wanted to feel as 
if Arthur were with her again. 

Adam cared for no words after that, and they hardly 
spoke through the rest of the walk. He only said, “ I may 
tell your uncle and aunt, may n't I, Hetty ? " and she said, 
“ Yes." 

The red firelight on the hearth at the Hall Farm shone 
on joyful faces that evening, when Hetty was gone upstairs 
and Adam took the opportunity of telling Mr. and Mrs. 
Poyser and the grandfather that he saw his way to maintain- 
ing a wife now, and that Hetty had consented to have him. 

“ I hope you have no objections against me for her hus- 
band," said Adam ; “ I 'm a poor man as yet, but she shall 
want nothing as I can work for." 

Objections? " said Mr. Poyser, while the grandfather 
leaned forward and brought out his long, ‘‘ Nay, nay." 
‘‘What objections can we ha' to you, lad? Neyer mind 
your being poorish as yet ; there 's money in your head-piece 

363 


ADAM BEDE 


as there 's money i’ the sown field, but it must ha' time. 
You 'n got enough to begin on, and we can do a deal tow’rt 
the bit o' furniture you ‘11 want. Thee 'st got feathers and 
linen to spare, — plenty, eh ? " 

This question was, of course, addressed to Mrs. Poyser, 
who was wrapped up in a warm shawl, and was too hoarse 
to speak with her usual facility. At first she only nodded 
emphatically, but she was presently unable to resist the 
temptation to be more explicit. 

“ It 'ud be a poor tale if I hadna feathers and linen," she 
said hoarsely, “ when I never sell a fowl but what 's plucked, 
and the wheel ‘s a-going every day o' the week." 

“ Come, my wench," said Mr. Poyser, when Hetty came 
down, “ come and kiss us, and let us wish you luck." 

Hetty went very quietly and kissed the big, good-natured 
man. 

“ There ! " he said, patting her on the back, ‘‘ go and kiss 
your aunt and your grandfather. I 'm as wishful t’ have you 
settled well as if you was my own daughter ; and so 's your 
aunt, I '11 be bound, for she 's done by you this seven 'ear, 
Hetty, as if you 'd been her own. Come, come now," he 
went on, becoming jocose, as soon as Hetty had kissed her 
aunt and the old man, “ Adam wants a kiss too, I 'll war- 
rant, and he 's a right to one now." 

Hetty turned away, smiling, towards her empty chair. 

“ Come, Adam, then, take one," persisted Mr. Poyser, 
“.else y' arena half a man." 

Adam got up, blushing like a small maiden, — great 
strong fellow as he was, — and, putting his arm round 
Hetty, stooped down and gently kissed her lips. 

It was a pretty scene in the red firelight ; for there were 
no candles, — why should there be, when the fire was so 
bright, and was reflected from all the pewter and the pol- 
ished oak? No one wanted to work on Sunday evening. 
Even Hetty felt something like contentment in the midst of 
all this love. Adam's attachment to her, Adam's caress, 
stirred no passion in her, were no longer enough to satisfy 
her vanity ; but they were the best her life offered her now, 
— they promised her some change. 

There was a great deal of discussion, before Adam went 

364 


THE HIDDEN DREAD 


away, about the possibility of his finding a house that would 
do for him to settle in. No house was empty except the one 
next to Will Maskery’s in the village, and that was too small 
for Adam now. Mr. Poyser insisted that the best plan would 
be for Seth and his mother to move, and leave Adam in the 
old home, which might be enlarged after a while, for there 
was plenty of space in the woodyard and garden ; but Adam 
objected to turning his mother out. 

''Well, well,” said Mr. Poyser, at last, "we needna fix 
everything to-night. We must take time to consider. You 
canna think o’ getting married afore Easter. I ’m not for 
long courtships, but there must be a bit o’ time to make 
things comfortable.” 

" Ay, to be sure,” said Mrs. Poyser, in a hoarse whisper ; 
" Christian folks can’t be married like cuckoos, I reckon.” 

" I ’m a bit daunted, though,” said Mr. Poyser, " when I 
think as we may have notice to quit, and belike be forced 
to take a farm twenty mile off.” 

" Eh,” said the old man, staring at the floor, and lifting 
his hands up and down, while his arms rested on the elbows 
of his chair, " it ’s a poor tale if I mun leave th’ ould spot, 
an’ be buried in a strange parish. An’ you ’ll happen ha’ 
double rates to pay,” he added, looking up at his son. 

" Well, thee mustna fret beforehand, father,” said Martin 
the younger. " Happen the Captain ’ull come home and 
make our peace wi’ th’ old Squire. I build upo’ that, for I 
know the Captain ’ll see folks righted if he can.” 


CHAPTER XXXV. 

THE HIDDEN DREAD. 

I T was a busy time for Adam, — the time between the be- 
ginning of November and the beginning of February, 
and he could see little of Hetty, except on Sundays. But a 
happy time, nevertheless ; for it was taking him nearer and 
nearer to March, when they were to be married ; and all the 
little preparations for their new housekeeping marked the 

365 


ADAM BEDE 


progress towards the longed-for day. Two new rooms had 
been “ run up ” to the old house ; for his mother and Seth 
were to live with them, after all. Lisbeth had cried so pite- 
ously at the thought of leaving Adam, that he had gone to 
Hetty and asked her if, for the love of him, she would put 
up with his mother’s ways, and consent to live with her. To 
his great delight, Hetty said, “Yes; I ’d as soon she lived 
with us as not.” Hetty’s mind was oppressed at that mo- 
ment with a worse difficulty than poor Lisbeth’s ways, she 
could not care about them. So Adam was consoled for the 
disappointment he had felt when Seth had come back from 
his visit to Snowfield and said, “ It was no use, — Dinah’s 
heart wasna turned towards marrying.” For when he told 
his mother that Hetty was willing they should all live to- 
gether, and there was no more need of them to think of 
parting, she said, in a more contented tone than he had 
heard her speak in since it had been settled that he was to 
be married : “ Eh, my lad, I ’ll be as still as th’ ould tabby, 
an’ ne’er want to do aught but th’ offal work, as she wonna 
like t’ do. An’ then we needna part the platters an’ things 
as ha’ stood on the shelf together sin’ afore thee wast bom.” 

There was only one cloud that now and then ‘came across 
Adam’s sunshine : Hetty seemed unhappy sometimes. But 
to all his anxious, tender questions she replied with an as- 
surance that she was quite contented, and wished nothing 
different ; and the next time he saw her she was more lively 
than usual. It might be that she was a little overdone with 
work and anxiety now, for soon after Christmas Mrs. Poyser 
had taken another cold, which had brought on inflammation, 
and this illness had confined her to her room all through 
January. Hetty had to manage everything downstairs, and 
half supply Molly’s place too, while that good damsel waited 
on her mistress ; and she seemed to throw herself so entirely 
into her new functions, working with a grave steadiness 
which was new in her, that Mr. Poyser often told Adam she 
was wanting to show him what a good housekeeper he would 
have ; but he “ doubted the lass was o’erdoing it, — she must 
have a bit o’ rest when her aunt could come downstairs.” 

This desirable event of Mrs. Poyser’s coming downstairs 
happened in the early part of February, when some mild 

366 


THE HIDDEN DREAD 


weather thawed the last patch of snow on the Binton Hills. 
On one of these days, soon after her aunt came down, Hetty 
went to Treddleston to buy some of the wedding things 
which were wanting, and which Mrs. Poyser had scolded 
her for neglecting, observing that she supposed “ it was be- 
cause they were not for th’ outside, else she M ha’ bought 
’em fast enough.” 

It was about ten o’clock when Hetty set off, and the slight 
hoar-frost that had whitened the hedges in the early morn- 
ing had disappeared as the sun mounted the cloudless sky. 
Bright February days have a stronger charm of hope about 
them than any other days in the year. One likes to pause 
in the mild rays of the sun, and look over the gates at the 
patient plough-horses turning at the end of the furrow, and 
think that the beautiful year is all before one. The birds 
seem to feel just the same ; their notes are as clear as the 
clear air. There are no leaves on the trees and hedgerows, 
but how green all the grassy fields arel and the dark pur- 
plish brown of the ploughed earth and of the bare branches 
is beautiful too. What a glad world this looks like, as one 
drives or rides along the valleys and over the hills ! I have 
often thought so when, in foreign countries, where the fields 
and woods have looked to me like our English Loamshire, 

— the rich land tilled with just as much care, the woods 
rolling down the gentle slopes to the green meadows, — I 
have come on something by the roadside which has reminded 
me that I am not in Loamshire : an image of a great agony, 

— the agony of the Cross. It has stood perhaps by the clus- 
tering apple-blossoms, or in the broad sunshine by the corn- 
field, or at a turning by the wood where a clear brook was 
gurgling below ; and surely, if there came a traveller to this 
world who knew nothing of the story of man’s life upon it, 
this image of agony would seem to him strangely out of 
place in the midst of this joyous nature. He would not 
know that hidden behind the apple-blossoms, or among the 
golden corn, or under the shrouding boughs of the wood 
there might be a human heart beating heavily with anguish ; 
perhaps a young blooming girl, not knowing where to turn 
for refuge from swift-advancing shame; understanding no 
more of this life of ours than a foolish lost lamb wandering 

367 


ADAM BEDE 


farther and farther in the nightfall on the lonely heath, yet 
tasting the bitterest of life’s bitterness. 

Such things are sometimes hidden among the sunny fields 
and behind the blossoming orchards ; and the sound of the 
gurgling brook, if you came close to one spot behind a small 
bush, would be mingled for your ear with a despairing hu- 
man sob. No wonder man’s religion has much sorrow in it ; 
no wonder he needs a suffering God. 

Hetty, in her red cloak and warm bonnet, with her basket 
in her hand, is turning towards a gate by the side of the 
Treddleston road, but not that she may have a more linger- 
ing enjoyment of the sunshine, and think with hope of the 
long unfolding year. She hardly knows that the sun is shin- 
ing; and for weeks now, when she has hoped at all, it has 
been for something at which she herself trembles and shud- 
ders. She only wants to be out of the highroad, that she 
may walk slowly, and not care how her face looks, as she 
dwells on wretched thoughts ; and through this gate she 
can get into a field-path behind the wide thick hedgerows. 
Her great dark eyes wander blankly over the fields, like the 
eyes of one who is desolate, homeless, unloved, not the prom- 
ised bride of a brave, tender man. But there are no tears in 
them ; her tears were all wept away in the weary night, be- 
fore she went to sleep. At the next stile the pathway 
branches off ; there are two roads before her, — one along 
by the hedgerow, which will by and by lead her into the 
road again ; the other across the fields, which will take her 
much farther out of the way into the Scantlands, — low 
shrouded pastures where she will see nobody. She chooses 
this, and begins to walk a little faster, as if she had sud- 
denly thought of an object towards which it was worth while 
to hasten. Soon she is in the Scantlands, where the grassy 
land slopes gradually downwards, and she leaves the level 
ground to follow the slope. Farther on there is a clump of 
trees on the low ground, and she is making her way towards 
it. No, it is not a clump of trees, but a dark shrouded pool, 
so full with the wintry rains that the under boughs of the 
elder-bushes lie low beneath the water. She sits down on 
the grassy bank, against the stooping sitem of the great oak 
that hangs over the dark pool. She has thought of this pool 

368 


THE HIDDEN DREAD 


often in the nights of the month that has just gone by, and 
now at last she is come to see it. She clasps her hands 
round her knees and leans forward, and looks earnestly at it, 
as if trying to guess what sort of bed it would make for her 
young round limbs. 

No, she has not courage to jump into that cold watery 
bed, and if she had, they might find her, — they might find 
out why she had drowned herself. There is but one thing 
left to her, — she must go away, go where they can’t find her. 

After the first on-coming of her great dread, some weeks 
after her betrothal to Adam, she had waited and waited, in 
the blind, vague hope that something would happen to set 
her free from her terror ; but she could wait no longer. All 
the force of her nature had been concentrated on the one 
effort of concealment, and she had shrunk with irresistible 
dread from every course that could tend towards a betrayal 
of her miserable secret. Whenever the thought of writing to 
Arthur had occurred to her, she had rejected it; he could do 
nothing for her that would shelter her from discovery and 
scorn among the relatives and neighbours who once more 
made all her world, now her airy dream had vanished. Her 
imagination no longer saw happiness with Arthur, for he 
could do nothing that would satisfy or soothe her pride. No, 
something else would happen — something must happen — 
to set her free from this dread. In young, childish, ignorant 
souls there is constantly this blind trust in some unshapen 
chance ; it is as hard to a boy or girl to believe that a great 
wretchedness will actually befall them, as to believe that they 
will die. 

But now necessity was pressing hard upon her, — now 
the time of her marriage was close at hand ; she could no 
longer rest in this blind trust. She must run away ; she must 
hide herself where no familiar eyes could detect her; and 
then the terror of wandering out into the world, of which she 
knew nothing, made the possibility of going to Arthur a 
thought which brought some comfort with it. She felt so 
helpless now, so unable to fashion the future for herself, that 
the prospect of throwing herself on him had a relief in it 
which was stronger than her pride. As she sat by the pool, 
and shuddered at the dark, cold water, the hope that he 

369 


24 


ADAM BEDE 


would receive her tenderly — thait he would care for her and 
think for her — was like a sense of lulling warmth, that made 
her for the moment indifferent to everything else ; and she 
began now to think of nothing but the scheme by which she 
should get away. 

She had had a letter from Dinah lately, full of kind words 
about the coming marriage, which she had heard of from 
Seth; and when Hetty had read this letter aloud to her 
uncle, he had said : “ I wish Dinah ’ud come again now, for 
she ’d be a comfort to your aunt when you ’re gone. What 
do you think, my wench, o’ going to see her as soon as you 
can be spared, and persuading her to come back wi’ you? 
You might happen persuade her wi’ telling her as her aunt 
wants her, for all she writes o’ not being able to come.” 
Hetty had not liked the thought of going to Snowfield, and 
felt no longing to see Dinah, so she only said, “ It ’s so far 
off, uncle.” But now she thought this pro-posed visit would 
serve as a pretext for going away. She would tell her aunt 
when she got home again, that she should like the change 
of going to Snowfield for a week or ten days. And then, 
when she got to Stoniton, where nobody knew her, she would 
ask for the coach that would take her on the way to Wind- 
sor. Arthur was at Windsor, and she would go to him. 

As soon as Hetty had determined on this scheme, she rose 
from the grassy bank of the pool, took up her basket, and 
went on her way to Treddleston, for she must buy the wed- 
ding things she had come out for, though she would never 
want them. She must be careful not to raise any suspicion 
that she w^as going to run away. 

Mrs. Poyser was quite agreeably surprised that Hetty 
wished to go and see Dinah, and try to bring her back to 
stay over the wedding. The sooner she went the better, 
since the weather was pleasant now ; and Adam, when he 
came in the evening, said, if Hetty could set off to-morrow, 
he would make time to go with her to Treddleston, and see 
her safe into the Stoniton coach. 

“ I wish I could go with you and take care of you, Hetty,” 
he said, the next morning, leaning in at the coach door; 

but you won’t stay much beyond a week, — the time ’ull 
seem long.” 


370 


THE HIDDEN DREAD 


He was looking at her fondly, and his strong hand held 
hers in its grasp. Hetty felt a sense of protection in his 
presence, — she was used to it now: if she could have had 
the past undone, and known no other love than her quiet 
liking for Adam ! The tears rose as she gave him the last 
look. 

“ God bless her for loving me,’' said Adam, as he went on 
his way to work again, with Gyp at his heels. 

But Hetty’s tears were not for Adam, — not for the an- 
guish that would come upon him when he found she was 
gone from him forever. They w^ere for the misery of her 
own lot, which took her away from this brave, tender man 
who offered up his whole life to her, and threw her, a poor 
helpless suppliant, on the man who would think it a mis- 
fortune that she was obliged to cling to him. 

At three o’clock that day, when Hetty was on the coach 
that was to take her, they said, to Leicester, — part of the 
long, long way to Windsor, — she felt dimly that she might 
be travelling all this weary journey towards the beginning 
of new misery. 

Y et Arthur was at Windsor ; he would surely not be angry 
with her. If he did not mind about her as he used to do, 
he had promised to be good to her. 


371 


BOOK V. 


CHAPTER XXXVI. 

THE JOURNEY IN HOPE. 

A long, lonely journey, with sadness in the heart, — 
away from the familiar to the strange, — that is a 
hard and dreary thing even to the rich, the strong, the in- 
structed ; a hard thing, even when we are called by duty, 
not urged by dread. 

What was it then to Hetty? With her poor narrow 
thoughts, no longer melting into vague hopes, but pressed 
upon by the chill of definite fear ; repeating again and again 
the same small round of memories, — shaping again and 
again the same childish, doubtful images of what was to 
come, — seeing nothing in this wide world but the little 
history of her own pleasures and pains ; with so little money 
in her pocket, and the way so long and difficult. Unless 
she could afford always to go in the coaches, — and she felt 
sure she could not, for the journey to Stoniton was more ex- 
pensive than she had expected, — it was plain that she must 
trust to carriers’ carts or slow wagons; and what a time it 
would be before she could get to the end of her journey! 
The burly old coachman from Oakbourne, seeing such a 
pretty young woman among the outside passengers, had in- 
vited her to come and sit beside him ; and feeling that it be- 
came him as a man and a coachman to open the dialogue 
with a joke, he applied himself as soon as they were off the 
stones to the elaboration of one suitable in all respects. 
After many cuts with his whip and glances at Hetty out 
of the corner of his eye, he lifted his lips above the edge of 
his wrapper, and said, — 

“ He ’s pretty nigh six foot, I ’ll be bound, isna he, now? ” 
Who? ” said Hetty, rather startled. 

372 


THE JOURNEY IN HOPE 


Why, the sweetheart as you Ve left behind, or else him 
as you Ve goin’ arter, — which is it ? 

Hetty felt her face flushing and then turning pale. She 
thought this coachman must know something about her. 
He must know Adam, and might tell him where she was 
gone; for it is difficult to country people to believe that 
those who make a figure in their own parish are not known 
everywhere else, and it was equally difficult to Hetty to un- 
derstand that chance words could happen to apply closely 
to her circumstances. She was too frightened to speak. 

“ Hegh, hegh ! said the coachman, seeing that his joke 
was not so gratifying as he had expected, “ you munna take 
it too ser’ous ; if he ’s behaved ill, get another. Such a 
pretty lass as you can get a sweetheart any day.’' 

Hetty’s fear was allayed by and by, when she found that 
the coachman made no further allusion to her personal 
concerns; but it still had the effect of preventing her from 
asking him what were the places on the road to Windsor. 
She told him she was only going a little way out of Stoni- 
ton, and when she got down at the inn where the coach 
stopped, she hastened away with her basket to another part 
of the town. When she had formed her plan of going to 
Windsor, she had not foreseen any difficulties except that 
of getting away; and after she had overcome this by pro- 
posing the visit to Dinah, her thoughts flew to the meeting 
with Arthur, and the question how he would behave to her, 
— not resting on any probable incidents of the journey. 
She was too entirely ignorant of travelling to imagine any 
of its details, and with all her store of money — her three 
guineas — in her pocket, she thought herself amply pro- 
vided. It was not until she found how much it cost her to 
get to Stoniton that she began to be alarmed about the 
journey, and then, for the first time, she felt her ignorance 
as to the places that must be passed on her way. Oppressed 
with this new alarm, she walked along the grim Stoniton 
streets, and at last turned into a shabby little inn, where she 
hoped to get a cheap lodging for the night. Here she 
asked the landlord if he could tell her what places she must 
go to, to get to Windsor. 

‘‘ Well, I can’t rightly say. Windsor must be pretty nigh 

373 


ADAM BEDE 


London, for it ’s where the king lives, was the answer. 

Anyhow, you ’d best go t’ Ashby next, — that ’s south- 
ward. But there ’s as many places from here to London as 
there ’s houses in Stoniton, by what I can make out. I ’ve 
never been no traveller myself. But how comes a lone 
young woman like you, to be thinking o’ taking such a 
journey as that ? ” 

I ’m going to my brother, — he ’s a soldier at Wind- 
sor,” said Hetty, frightened at the landlord’s questioning 
look. “ I can’t afford to go by the coach : do you think 
there’s a cart goes toward Ashby in the morning? ” 

“ Yes, there be carts if anybody knowed where they started 
from ; but you might run over the town before you found 
out. You ’d best set off and walk, and trust to summat 
overtaking you.” 

Every word sank like lead on Hetty’s spirits. She saw 
the journey stretch bit by bit before her now; even to get 
to Ashby seemed a hard thing; it might take the day, for 
what she knew, and that was nothing to the rest of the jour- 
ney. But it must be done, — she must get to Arthur. Oh, 
how she yearned to be again with somebody who would 
care for her! She who had never got up in the morning 
without the certainty of seeing familiar faces, people on 
whom she had an acknowledged claim ; whose farthest jour- 
ney had been to Rosseter on the pillion with her uncle; 
whose thoughts had always been taking holiday in dreams 
of pleasure, because all the business of her life was managed 
for her, — this kitten-like Hetty, who till a few months ago 
had never felt any other grief than that of envying Mary 
Burge a new ribbon, or being girded at by her aunt for 
neglecting Totty, must now make her toilsome way in lone- 
liness, her peaceful home left behind forever, and nothing 
but a tremulous hope of distant refuge before her. Now for 
the first time, as she lay down to-night in the strange, hard 
bed, she felt that her home had been a happy one ; that her 
uncle had been very good to her ; that her quiet lot at Hay- 
slope among the things and people she knew, with her little 
pride in her one best gown and bonnet, and nothing to hide 
from any one, was what she would like to wake up to as a 
reality, and find that all the feverish life she had known be- 

374 


THE JOURNEY IN HOPE 


sides was a short nightmare. She thought of all she had 
left behind with yearning regret for her own sake; her own 
misery filled her heart; there was no room in it for other 
people’s sorrow. And yet, before the cruel letter, Arthur 
had been so tender and loving ; the memory of that had still 
a charm for her, though it was no more than a soothing 
di aught that just made pain bearable. For Hetty could 
conceive no other existence for herself in future than a hid- 
den one, and a hidden life, even with love, would have had 
no delights for her ; still less a life mingled with shame. She 
knew no romances, and had only a feeble share in the feel- 
ings which are the source of romance, so that well-read ladies 
may find it difficult to understand her state of mind. She 
v/as too ignorant of everything beyond the simple notions 
and habits in which she had been brought up, to have any 
more definite idea of her probable future than that Arthur 
would take care of her somehow, and shelter her from anger 
and scorn. He would not marry her and make her a lady ; 
and apart from that she could think of nothing he could 
give towards which she looked with longing and ambition. 

The next morning she rose early, and taking only some 
milk and bread for her breakfast, set out to walk on the 
road towards Ashby, under a leaden-coloured sky, with a 
narrowing streak of yellow, like a departing hope, on the 
edge of the horizon. Now in her faintness of heart at the 
length and difficulty of her journey, she was most of all 
afraid of spending her money, and becoming so destitute 
that she would have to ask people’s charity ; for Hetty had 
the pride not only of a proud nature but of a proud class, — 
the class that pays the most poor-rates, and most shudders 
at the idea of profiting by a poor-rate. It had not yet oc- 
curred to her that she might get money for her locket and 
ear-rings which she carried with her, and she applied all her 
small arithmetic and knowledge of prices to calculating how 
many meals and how many rides were contained in her two 
guineas and the odd shillings, which had a melancholy look, 
as if they were the pale ashes of the other bright-flaming 
coin. 

For the first few miles out of Stoniton she walked on 
bravely, always fixing on some tree or gate or projecting 

375 


ADAM BEDE 


bush at the most distant visible point in the road as a goal, 
and feeling a faint joy when she had reached it. But when 
she came to the fourth milestone, the first she had happened 
to notice among the long grass by the roadside, and read 
that she was still only four miles beyond Stoniton, her cour- 
age sank. She had come only this little way, and yet felt 
tired, and almost hungry again in the keen morning air; 
for though Hetty was accustomed to much movement and 
exertion in-doors, she was not used to long walks, which 
produced quite a different sort of fatigue from that of 
household activity. As she was looking at the milestone, 
she felt some drops falling on her face, — it was beginning 
to rain. Here was a new trouble which had not entered 
into her sad thoughts before; and quite weighed down by 
this sudden addition to her burden, she sat down on the 
step of a stile and began to sob hysterically. The begin- 
ning of hardship is like the first taste of bitter food, — it 
seems for a moment unbearable ; yet if there is nothing else 
to satisfy our hunger, we take another bite and find it possi- 
ble to go on. When Hetty recovered from her burst of 
weeping, she rallied her fainting courage ; it was raining, 
and she must try to get on to a village where she might 
find rest and shelter. Presently, as she walked on wearily, 
she heard the rumbling of heavy wheels behind her; a cov- 
ered wagon was coming, creeping slowly along with a 
slouching driver cracking his whip beside the horses. She 
waited for it, thinking that if the wagoner were not a very 
sour-looking man, she would ask him to take her up. As 
the wagon approached her, the driver had fallen behind; 
but there was something in the front of the big vehicle 
which encouraged her. At any previous moment in her life 
she would not have noticed it ; but now the new susceptibil- 
ity that suffering had awakened in her caused this object to 
impress her strongly. It was only a small white-and-liver- 
coloured spaniel which sat on the front ledge of the wagon, 
with large timid eyes, and an incessant trembling in the 
body, such as you may have seen in some of these small 
creatures. Hetty cared little for animals, as you know : but 
at this moment she felt as if the helpless, timid creature had 
some fellowship with her, and without being quite aware of 

376 


THE JOURNEY IN HOPE 


the reason, she was less doubtful about speaking to the 
driver, who now came forward, — a large, ruddy man, with 
a sack over his shoulders, by way of scarf or mantle. 

“ Could you take me up in your wagon, if you 're going 
towards Ashby ? ” said Hetty. “ I ’ll pay you for it.” 

“ Aw,” said the big fellow, with that slowly dawning 
smile which belongs to heavy faces, “ I can take y’ up fawst 
enough wi’out bein’ paid for ’t, if you dooant mind lyin’ a 
bit closish a-top o’ the wool-packs. ^Where do you coom 
from, and what do you want at Ashby? ” 

“ I come from Stoniton. I ’m going a long way, — to 
Windsor.” 

What ! arter some service, or what ? ” 

Going to my brother, — he ’s a soldier there.” 

''Well, I’m going no furder nor Leicester, — and fur 
enough, too, — but I ’ll take you, if you dooant mind being 
a bit long on the road. The bosses wooant feel your weight 
no more nor they feel the little doog there, as I puck up on 
the road a fortni’t agoo. He war lost, I b’lieve, an’ ’s been 
all of a tremble iver sin’. Come, gi’ us your basket, an’ 
come behind an’ let me put y’ in.” 

To lie on the wool-packs, with a cranny left between the 
curtains of the awning to let in the air, was luxury to Hetty 
now, and she half slept away the hours till the driver came 
to ask her if she wanted to get down and have " some 
victual he himself was going to eat his dinner at this " pub- 
lic.” Late at night they reached Leicester, and so this sec- 
ond day of Hetty’s journey was past. She had spent no 
money except what she had paid for her food; but she felt 
that this slow journeying would be intolerable for her an- 
other day, and in the morning she found her way to a coach- 
office to ask about the road to Windsor, and see if it would 
cost her too much to go part of the distance by coach again. 
Yes! the distance was too great, the coaches were too dear, 
— she must give them up ; but the elderly clerk at the office, 
touched by her pretty, anxious face, wrote down for her 
the names of the chief places she must pass through. This 
was the only comfort she got in Leicester; for the men 
stared at her as she went along the street, and for the first 
time in her life Hetty wished no one would look at her. She 

377 


ADAM BEDE 


set out walking again ; but this day she was fortunate, for 
she was soon overtaken by a carrier’s cart which carried her 
to Hinckley, and by the help of a return chaise, with a 
drunken postilion, — who frightened her by driving like 
Jehu the son of Nimshi, and shouting hilarious remarks at 
her, twisting himself backwards on his saddle, — she was 
before night in the heart of woody Warwickshire ; but still 
almost a hundred miles from Windsor, they told her. Oh, 
what a large world it was, and what hard work for her to 
find her way in it ! She went by mistake to Stratford-on- 
Avon, finding Stratford set down in her list of places, and 
then she was told she had come a long way out of the right 
road. It was not till the fifth day that she got to Stony 
Stratford. That seems but a slight journey as you look at 
the map, or remember your own pleasant travels to and 
from the meadowy banks of the Avon. But how wearily 
long it was to Hetty ! It seemed to her as if this country 
of flat fields and hedgerows, and dotted houses, and villages, 
and market-towns, — all so much alike to her indifferent 
eyes, — must have no end, and she must go on wandering 
among them forever, waiting tired at toll-gates for some 
cart to come, and then finding the cart went only a little 
way, — a very little way, — to the miller’s a mile off per- 
haps; and she hated going into the public-houses, where 
she must go to get food and ask questions, because there 
were always men lounging there, who stared at her and 
joked her rudely. Her body was very weary too with these 
days of new fatigue and anxiety ; they had made her look 
more pale and worn than all the time of hidden dread she 
had gone through at home. When at last she reached 
Stony Stratford, her impatience and weariness had become 
too strong for her economical caution ; she determined to 
take the coach for the rest of the way, though it should cost 
her all her remaining money. She would need nothing at 
Windsor but to find Arthur. When she had paid the fare for 
the last coach, she had only a shilling ; and as she got down 
at the sign of the Green Man in Windsor at twelve o’clock in 
the middle of the seventh day, hungry and faint, the coach- 
man came up and begged her to remember him.” She put 
her hand in her pocket and took out the shilling; but the 

378 


THE JOURNEY IN HOPE 


tears came with the sense of exhaustion and the thought that 
she was giving away her last means of getting food, which 
she really required before she could go in search of Arthur. 
As she held out the shilling, she lifted up her dark tear-filled 
eyes to the coachman’s face and said, — 

Can you give me back sixpence ? ” 

“ No, no,” he said gruffly, “ never mind, — put the shilling 
up again.” 

The landlord of the Green Man had stood near enough 
to witness this scene, and he was a man whose abundant feed- 
ing served to keep his good-nature, as well as his person, in 
high condition ; and that lovely tearful face of Hetty’s would 
have found out the sensitive fibre in most men. 

“ Come, young woman, come in,” he said, “ and have a 
drop o’ something ; you ’re pretty well knocked up, I can see 
that.” 

He took her into the bar, and said to his wife, Here, 
missis, take this young woman into the parlour ; she ’s a little 
overcome,” — for Hetty’s tears were falling fast. They were 
merely hysterical tears; she thought she had no reason for 
w'eeping now, and was vexed that she was too weak and tired 
to help it. She was at Windsor at last, not far from Arthur. 

She looked with eager, hungry eyes at the bread and meat 
and beer that the landlady brought her, and for some minutes 
she forgot everything else in the delicious sensations of sat- 
isfying hunger and recovering from exhaustion. The land- 
lady sat opposite to her as she ate, and looked at her ear- 
nestly. No wonder; Hetty had thrown off her bonnet, and 
her curls had fallen down. Her face was all the more touch- 
ing in its youth and beauty because of its weary look ; and 
the good woman’s eyes presently wandered to her figure, 
which in her hiirried dressing on her journey she had taken 
no pains to conceal ; moreover, the stranger’s eye detects 
what the familiar unsuspecting eye leaves unnoticed. 

“ Why, you ’re not very fit for travelling,” she said, 
glancing while she spoke at Hetty’s ringless hand. “ Have 
you come far ? ” 

“ Yes,” said Hetty, roused by this question to exert more 
self-command, and feeling the better for the food she had 
taken. “ I ’ve come a good long way, and it ’s very tiring. 

' 379 


ADAM BEDE 


But I better now. Could you tell me which way to go to 
this place ? ’’ Here Hetty took from her pocket a bit of 
paper; it was the end of Arthur’s letter on which he had 
written his address. 

While she was speaking, the landlord had come in, and had 
begun to look at her as earnestly as his wife had done. He 
took up the piece of paper which Hetty handed across the 
table, and read the address. 

“ Why, what do you want at this house ? ” he said. It is in 
the nature of innkeepers and all men who have no pressing- 
business of their own, to ask as many questions as possible 
before giving any information. 

“ I want to see a gentleman as is there,” said Hetty. 

But there ’s no gentleman there,” returned the landlord. 

It ’s shut up, — been shut up this fortnight. What gentle- 
man is it you want ? Perhaps I can let you know where to 
find him.” 

It ’s Captain Donnithorne,” said Hetty, tremulously, her 
heart beginning to beat painfully at this disappointment of 
her hope that she should find Arthur at once. 

“ Captain Donnithorne ? Stop a bit,” said the landlord, 
slowly. “Was he in the Loamshire Militia? A tall young 
officer with a fairish skin and reddish whiskers, and had a 
servant by the name o’ Pym ? ” 

“ Oh, yes,” said Hetty ; “ you know him — where is he ? ” 

“ A fine sight o’ miles away from here : the Loamshire 
Militia ’s gone to Ireland ; it ’s been gone this fortnight.” 

“ Look there ! she ’s fainting,” said the landlady, hastening 
to support Hetty, who had lost her miserable consciousness 
and looked like a beautiful corpse. They carried her to the 
sofa and loosened her dress. 

“ Here ’s a bad business, I suspect,” said the landlord, as 
he brought in some water. 

“ Ah, it ’s plain enough what sort of business it is,” said 
the wife. “ She ’s not a common flaunting dratchell, I can 
see that. She looks like a respectable country girl, and she 
comes from a good way off, to judge by her tongue. She 
talks something like that ostler we had that come from the 
north : he was as honest a fellow as we ever had about the 
house, — they ’re all honest folks in the north.” 

380 


THE JOURNEY IN DESPAIR 


“ I never saw a prettier young woman in my life/’ said the 
husband. She ’s like a pictur in a shop-winder. It goes to 
one’s ’eart to look at her.” 

It ’ud have been a good deal better for her if she ’d been 
uglier and had more conduct,” said the landlady, who on any 
charitable construction must have been supposed to have 
more “ conduct ” than beauty. “ But she’s coming to again. 
Fetch a drop more water.” 


CHAPTER XXXVII. 

THE JOURNEY IN DESPAIR. 

H etty was too ill through the rest of that day for any 
questions to be addressed to her, — too ill even to 
think with any distinctness of the evils that were to come. 
She only felt that all her hope was crushed, and that in- 
stead of having found a refuge she had only reached the 
borders of a new wilderness where no goal lay before her. 
The sensations of bodily sickness, in a comfortable bed, and 
with the tendance of the good-natured landlady, made a sort 
of respite for her, — such a respite as there is in the faint 
weariness which oblige a man to throw himself on the sand, 
instead of toiling onward under the scorching sun. 

But when sleep and rest had brought back the strength 
necessary for the keenness of mental suffering, — when she 
lay the next morning looking at the growing light, which 
was like a cruel taskmaster returning to urge from her a 
fresh round of hated, hopeless labour, — she began to think 
what course she must take, to remember that all her money 
was gone, to look at the prospect of further wandering 
among strangers with the new clearness shed on it by the 
experience of her journey to Windsor. But which way could 
she turn ? It was impossible for her to enter into any service, 
even if she could obtain it ; there was nothing but immedi- 
ate beggary before her. She thought of a young woman 
who had been found against the church wall at Hayslope one 
Sunday, nearly dead with cold and hunger, — a tiny infant 

381 


ADAM BEDE 


in her arms ; the woman was rescued and taken to the parish. 
“ The parish! ” You can perhaps hardly understand the ef- 
fect of that word on a mind like Hetty’s, brought up among 
people who were somewhat hard in their feelings even to- 
wards poverty, who lived among the fields, and had little pity 
for want and rags as a cruel, inevitable fate such as they 
sometimes seem in cities, but held them a mark of idleness 
and vice, — and it was idleness and vice that brought 
burthens on the parish. To Hetty the ‘‘ parish ” was next 
to the prison in obloquy ; and to ask anything of strangers 
— to beg — lay in the same far-off hideous region of intoler- 
able shame that Hetty had all her life thought it impossible 
she could ever come near. But now the remembrance of that 
wretched woman whom she had seen herself, on her way 
from church, being carried into Joshua Kami’s, came back 
upon her with the new, terrible sense that there was very 
little now to divide her from the same lot. And the dread of 
bodily hardship mingled with the dread of shame ; for Hetty 
had the luxurious nature of a round, soft-coated pet animal. 

How she yearned to be back in her safe home again, cher- 
ished and cared for as she had always been ! Her aunt’s 
scolding about trifles would have been music to her ears now ; 
she longed for it, — she used to hear it in a time when she 
had only trifles to hide. Could she be the same Hetty that 
used to make up the butter in the dairy with the Gueldres 
roses peeping in at the window, — she, a runaway whom her 
friends would not open their doors to again, lying in this 
strange bed, with the knowledge that she had no money to 
pay for what she received, and must offer those strangers 
some of the clothes in her basket? It was then she thought 
of her locket and ear-rings ; and seeing her pocket lie near, 
she reached it and spread the contents on the bed before her. 
There were the locket and ear-rings in the little velvet-lined 
boxes, and with them there was a beautiful silver thimble 
which Adam had bought her, the words “ Remember me ” 
making the ornament of the border ; a steel purse, with her 
one shilling in it, and a small red-leather case, fastening with 
a strap. Those beautiful little ear-rings, with their delicate 
pearls and garnet, that she had tried in her ears with such 
longing in the bright sunshine on the 30th of July! She 

382 


THE JOURNEY IN DESPAIR 


had no longing to put them in her ears now ; her head with 
its dark rings of hair lay back languidly on the pillow, and 
the sadness that rested about her brow and eyes was some- 
thing too hard for regretful memory. Yet she put her hands 
up to her ears; it was because there were some thin gold 
ring^ in them, which were also worth a little money. Yes, 
she could surely get some money for her ornaments; those 
Arthur had given her must have cost a great deal of money. 
The landlord and landlady had been good to her; perhaps 
they would help her to get the money for these things. 

But this money would not keep her long; what should she 
do when it was gone ? Where should she go ? The horrible 
thought of want and beggary drove her once to think she 
would go back to her uncle and aunt, and ask them to forgive 
her and have pity on her. But she shrank from that idea 
again, as she might have shrunk from scorching metal ; she 
could never endure that shame before her uncle and aunt, 
before Mary Burge, and the servants at the Chase, and the 
people at Broxton, and everybody who knew her. They 
should never know what had happened to her. What could 
she do? She would go away from Windsor, — travel again 
as she had done the last week, and get among the flat green 
fields with the high hedges round them, where nobody could 
see her or know her; and there, perhaps, when there was 
nothing else she could do, she should get courage to drown 
herself in some pond like that in the Scantlands. Yes, she 
would get away from Windsor as soon as possible ; she did n’t 
like these people at the inn to know about her, to know that 
she had come to look for Captain Donnithorne; she must 
think of some reason to tell them why she had asked for him. 

With this thought she began to put the things back into 
her pocket, meaning to get up and dress before the landlady 
came to her. She had her hand on the red-leather case, when 
it occurred to her that there might be something in this case 
which she had forgotten, — something worth selling; for 
without knowing what she should do with her life, she craved 
the means of living as long as possible ; and when we desire 
eagerly to find something, we are apt to search for it in hope- 
less places. No, there was nothing but common needles and 
pins, and dried tulip-petals between the paper leaves where 

383 


ADAM BEDE 


she had written down her little money-accounts. But on one 
of these leaves there was a name, which, often as she had 
seen it before, now flashed on Hetty’s mind like a newly dis- 
covered message. The name was — Dinah Morris, Snow- 
held. There was a text above it, written, as well as the name, 
by Dinah’s own hand with a little pencil, one evening that 
they were sitting together and Hetty happened to have the 
red case lying open before her. Hetty did not read the text 
now ; she was only arrested by the name. Now, for the first 
time, she remembered without indifference the affectionate 
kindness Dinah had shown her, and those words of Dinah in 
the bed-chamber, — that Hetty must think of her as a friend 
in trouble. Suppose she were to go to Dinah and ask her 
to help her ? Dinah did not think about things as other peo- 
ple did ; she was a mystery to Hetty, but Hetty knew she 
was always kind. She could n’t imagine Dinah’s face turn- 
ing away from her in dark reproof or scorn, Dinah’s voice 
willingly speaking ill of her or rejoicing in her misery as a 
punishment. Dinah did not seem to belong to that world 
of Hetty’s, whose glance she dreaded like scorching fire. 
But even to her Hetty shrank from beseeching and confes- 
sion ; she could not prevail on herself to say, “ I will go to 
Dinah ; ” she only thought of that as a possible alternative, 
if she had not courage for death. 

The good landlady was amazed when she saw Hetty come 
downstairs soon after herself, neatly dressed, and looking 
resolutely self-possessed. Hetty told her she was quite well 
this morning; she had only been very tired and overcome 
with her journey, for she had come a long way to ask about 
her brother, who had run away, and they thought he was 
gone for a soldier, and Captain Donnithorne must know, for 
he had been very kind to her brother once. It was a lame 
story, and the landlady looked doubtfully at Hetty as she 
told it; but there was a resolute air of self-reliance about 
her this morning, so different from the helpless prostration 
of yesterday, that the landlady hardly knew how to make a 
remark that might seem like prying into other people’s af- 
fairs. She only invited her to sit down to breakfast with 
them, and in the course of it Hetty brought out her ear-rings 
and locket, and asked the landlord if he could help her to 

384 


THE JOURNEY IN DESPAIR 


get money for them; her journey, she said, had cost her 
much more than she expected, and now she had no money 
to get back to her friends, which she wanted to do at once. 

It was not the first time the landlady had seen the orna- 
ments, for she had examined the contents of Hetty’s pocket 
yesterday, and she and her husband had discussed the fact 
of a country girl having these beautiful things, with a 
stronger conviction than ever that Hetty had been miserably 
deluded by the fine young officer. 

“ Well,” said the landlord, when Hetty had spread the 
precious trifles before him, we might take ’em to the jewel- 
ler’s shop, for there ’s one not far off ; but Lord bless you, 
they would n’t give you a quarter o’ what the things are 
worth. And you would n’t like to part with ’em ? ” he added, 
looking at her inquiringly. 

“ Oh, I don’t mind,” said Hetty, hastily, so as I can get 
money to go back.” 

“ And they might think the things were stolen, as you 
wanted to sell ’em,” he went on ; “ for it is n’t usual for a 
young woman like you to have fine jew’llery like that.” 

The blood rushed to Hetty’s face with anger. I belong 
to respectable folks,” she said ; “I’m not a thief.” 

“ No, that you are n’t, I ’ll be bound,” said the landlady ; 
“ and you ’d no call to say that,” looking indignantly at her 
husband. “ The things were gev to her ; that ’s plain enough 
to be seen.” 

“ I did n’t mean as I thought so,” said the husband, apolo- 
getically ; “ but I said it was what the jeweller might think, 
and so he would n’t be offering much money for ’em.” 

“ Well,” said the wife, “ suppose you were to advance some 
money on the things yourself, and then if she liked to redeem 
’em when she got home, she could. But if we heard nothing 
from her after two months, we might do as we liked with 
em. 

I will not say that in this accommodating proposition the 
landlady had no regard whatever to the possible reward of 
her good-nature in the ultimate possession of the locket and 
ear-rings; indeed, the effect they would have in that case 
on the mind of the grocer’s wife had presented itself with 
remarkable vividness to her rapid imagination. The land- 

38s 


25 


ADAM BEDE 


lord took up the ornaments, and pushed out his lips in a 
meditative manner. He wished Hetty well, doubtless; but 
pray, how many of your well-wishers would decline to make 
a little gain out of you? Your landlady is sincerely affected 
at parting with you, respects you highly, and will really re- 
joice if any one else is generous to you ; but at the same time 
she hands you a bill by which she gains as high a percentage 
as possible. 

“ How much money do you want to get home with, young 
woman ? ’’ said the well-wisher, at length. 

‘‘ Three guineas,” answered Hetty, fixing on the sum she 
set out with, for want of any other standard, and afraid of 
asking too much. 

“ Well, I Ve no objections to advance you three guineas,” 
said the landlord ; “ and if you like to send it me back and 
get the jewellery again, you can, you know : the Green Man 
is n’t going to run away.” 

Oh, yes, I ’ll be very glad if you ’ll give me that,” said 
Hetty, relieved at the thought that she would not have to 
go to the jeweller’s, and be stared at and questioned. 

But if you want the things again, you ’ll write before 
long,” said the landlady, “ because when two months are up, 
we shall make up our minds as you don’t want ’em.” 

“ Yes,” said Hetty, indifferently. 

The husband and wife were equally content with this ar- 
rangement. The husband thought, if the ornaments were 
not redeemed, he could make a good thing of it by taking 
them to London and selling them ; the wife thought she 
would coax the good man into letting her keep them. And 
they were accommodating Hetty, poor thing, — a pretty, re- 
spectable-looking young woman, apparently in a sad case. 
They declined to take anything for her food and bed ; she 
was quite welcome. And at eleven o’clock Hetty said 
‘‘ Good-by ” to them, with the same quiet, resolute air she 
had worn all the morning, mounting the coach that was to 
take her twenty miles back along the way she had come. 

There is a strength of self-possession which is the sign 
that the last hope has departed. Despair no more leans on 
others than perfect contentment, and in despair pride ceases 
to be counteracted by the sense of dependence. 

386 


THE JOURNEY IN DESPAIR 


Hetty felt that no one could deliver here from the evils 
that would make life hateful to her; and no one, she said 
to herself, should ever know her misery and humiliation. 
No ; she would not confess even to Dinah : she would wander 
out of sight, and drown herself where her body would never 
be found, and no one should know what had become of her. 

When she got off this coach, she began to walk again, 
and take cheap rides in carts, and get cheap meals, going 
on and on without distinct purpose, yet strangely, by some 
fascination, taking the way she had come, though she was 
determined not to go back to her own country. Perhaps it 
was because she had fixed her mind on the grassy Warwick- 
shire field, with the bushy tree-studded hedgerows that made 
a hiding-place even in this leafless season. She went more 
slowly than she came, often getting over the stiles and sitting 
for hours under the hedgerows, looking before her with 
blank, beautiful eyes ; fancying herself at the edge of a hid- 
den pool, low down, like that in the Scantlands; wonder- 
ing if it were very painful to be drowned, and if there would 
be anything worse after death than what she dreaded in life. 
Religious doctrines had taken no hold on Hetty’s mind ; she 
was one of those numerous people who have had godfathers 
and godmothers, lejarned their catechism, been confirmed, 
and gone to church every Sunday, and yet, for any practical 
result of strength in life or trust in death, have never appro- 
priated a single Christian idea or Christian feeling. You 
would misunderstand her thoughts during these wretched 
days, if you imagined that they were influenced either by 
religious fears or religious hopes. 

She chose to go to Stratford-on-Avon again, where she 
had gone before by mistake; for she remembered some 
grassy fields on her former way towards it, — fields among 
which she thought she might find just the sort of pool she 
had in her mind. Yet she took care of her money still; she 
carried her basket : death seemed still a long way off, and 
life was so strong in her ! She craved food and rest, — she 
hastened towards them at the very moment she was picturing 
to herself the bank from which she would leap towards death. 
It was already five days since she had left Windsor, for she 
had wandered about, always avoiding speech or questioning 

387 


ADAM BEDE 


looks, and recovering her air of proud self-dependence 
whenever she was under observation, choosing her 
decent lodging at night, and dressing herself neatly in the 
morning, and setting off on her way steadily, or remaining 
under shelter if it rained, as if she had a happy life to cherish. 

And yet, even in her most self-conscious moments, the 
face was sadly different from that which had smiled at itself 
in the old specked glass, or smiled at others when they 
glanced at it admiringly. A hard and even fierce look had 
come in the eyes, though their lashes were as long as ever, 
and they had all their dark brightness. And the cheek was 
never dimpled with smiles now. It was the same rounded, 
pouting, childish prettiness, but with all love and belief in 
love departed from it, — the sadder for its beauty, like that 
wondrous Medusa-face, with the passionate, passionless lips. 

At last she was among the fields she had been dreaming 
of, on a long narrow pathway leading towards a wood. If 
there should be a pool in that wood ! It would be better 
hidden than one in the fields. No, it was not a wood, only a 
wild brake, where there had once been gravel-pits, leaving 
mounds and hollows studded with brushwood and small 
trees. She roamed up and down, thinking there was perhaps 
a pool in every hollow before she came to it, till her limbs 
were weary, and she sat down to rest. The afternoon was 
far advanced, and the leaden sky was darkening, as if the 
sun were setting behind it. After a little while Hetty started 
up again, feeling that darkness would soon come on; and 
she must put off finding the pool till to-morrow, and make 
her way to some shelter for the night. She had quite lost her 
way in the fields, and might as well go in one direction as 
another, for aught she knew. She walked through field after 
field, and no village, no house was in sight; but there, at 
the corner of this pasture, there was a break in the hedges ; 
the land seemed to dip down a little, and two trees leaned 
towards each other across the opening. Hetty’s heart gave 
a great beat as she thought there must be a pool there. 
She walked towards it heavily over the tufted grass, with 
pale lips and a sense of trembling; it was as if the thing 
were come in spite of herself, instead of being the object of 
her search. 


388 


THE JOURNEY IN DESPAIR 


There it was, black under the darkening sky, — no mo- 
tion, no sound, near. She set down her basket, and then 
sank down herself on the grass, trembling. The pool had 
its wintry depth now; by the time it got shallow, as she 
lemembered the pools did at Hayslope in the summer, no 
one could find out that it was her body. But then there was 
her basket, — she must hide that too ; she must throw it 
into the water, — make it heavy with stones first, and then 
throw it in. She got up to look about for stones, and soon 
brought five or six, , which she laid down beside her basket, 
and then sat down again. There was no need to hurry, — 
there was all the night to drown herself in. She sat leaning 
her elbow on the basket. She was weary, hungry. There 
were some buns in her basket, — three, which she had sup- 
plied herself with at the place where she ate her dinner. She 
took them out now, and ate them eagerly, and then sat still 
again, looking at the pool. The soothed sensation that came 
over her from the satisfaction of her hunger, and this fixed 
dreamy attitude brought on drowsiness, and presently her 
head sank down on her knees. She was fast asleep. 

When she awoke it was deep night, and she felt chill. She 
was frightened at this darkness, — frightened at the long 
night before her. If she could but throw herself into the 
water! No, not yet. She began to walk about that she 
might get warm again, as if she would have more resolution 
then. Oh, how long the time was in that darkness! The 
bright hearth and the warmth and the voices of home, — 
the secure uprising and lying down, — the familiar fields, the 
familiar people, the Sundays and holidays with their sim- 
ple joys of dress and feasting, — all the sweets of her young 
life rushed before her now, and she seemed to be stretching 
her arms towards them across a great gulf. She set her 
teeth when she thought of Arthur ; she cursed him, without 
knowing what her cursing would do; she wished he too 
might know desolation, and cold, and a life of shame that he 
dared not end by death. 

The horror of this cold and darkness and solitude — out 
of all human reach — became greater every long minute ; it 
was almost as if she were dead already, and knew that she 
was dead, and longed to get back to life again. But no: 

389 


ADAM BEDE 


she was alive still ; she had not taken the dreadful leap. 
She felt a strange contradictory wretchedness and exulta- 
tion, — wretchedness, that she did not dare to face death ; 
exultation, that she was still in life, that she might yet know 
light and warmth again. She walked backwards and for- 
wards to warm herself, beginning to discern something of 
the objects around her, as her eyes became accustomed to 
the night : the darker line of the hedge, the rapid motion of 
some living creature — perhaps a field-mouse — rushing 
across the grass. She no longer felt as if the darkness 
hedged her in ; she' thought she could walk back across the 
field, and get over the stile ; and then, in the very next field, 
she thought she remembered there was a hovel of furze near 
a sheepfold. If she could get into that hovel, she would be 
warmer; she could pass the night there, for that was what 
Alick did at Hayslope in lambing-time. The thought of 
this hovel brought the energy of a new hope ; she took up 
her basket and walked across the field, but it was some time 
before she got in the right direction for the stile. The ex- 
ercise and the occupation of finding the stile were a stimulus 
to her, however, and lightened the horror of the darkness 
and solitude. There were sheep in the next field, and she 
startled a group as she set down her basket and got over 
the stile ; and the sound of their movement comforted her, 
for it assured her that her impression was right : this was 
the field where she had seen the hovel, for it was the field 
where the sheep were. Right on along the path, and she 
would get to it. She reached the opposite gate, and felt her 
way along its rails, and the rails of the sheepfold, till her 
hand encountered the pricking of the gorsy wall. Delicious 
sensation ! She had found the shelter ; she groped her way, 
touching the prickly gorse, to the door, and pushed it open. 
It was an ill-smelling, close place, but warm, and there was 
straw on the ground. Hetty sank down on the straw with 
a sense of escape. Tears came, — she had never shed tears 
before since she left Windsor, — tears and sobs of hysterical 
joy that she had still hold of life, that she was still on the 
familiar earth, with the sheep near her. The very con- 
sciousness of her own limbs was a delight to her ; she turned 
up her sleeves, and kissed her arms with the passionate love 


390 


THE JOURNEY IN DESPAIR 


of life. Soon warmth and weariness lulled her in the midst 
of her sobs, and she fell continually into dozing, fancying 
herself at the brink of the pool again, — fancying that she 
had jumped into the water, and then awakening with a start, 
and wondering where she was. But at last deep, dreamless 
sleep came ; her head, guarded by her bonnet, found a pillow 
against the gorsy wall ; and the poor soul, driven to and fro 
between two equal terrors, found the one relief that was pos- 
sible to it, — relief of unconsciousness. 

Alas ! that relief seems to end the moment it has begun. 
It seemed to Hetty as if those dozen dreams had only passed 
into anothei: dream, — that she was in the hovel, and her 
aunt was standing over her with a candle in her hand. She 
trembled under her aunt’s glance, and opened her eyes. 
There was no candle, but there was light in the hovel, — the 
light of early morning through the open door. And there 
was a face looking down on her; but it was an unknown 
face, belonging to an elderly man in a smock-frock. 

Why, what do you do here, young woman ? ” the man 
said roughly. 

Hetty trembled still worse under this real fear and shame 
than she had done in her momentary dream under her aunt’s 
glance. She felt that she was like a beggar already, — 
found sleeping in that place. But in spite of her trembling, 
she was so eager to account to the man for her presence 
here that she found words at once. 

‘‘ I lost my way,” she said. “ I ’m travelling — north’ard, 
and I got away from the road into the fields, and was over- 
taken by the dark. Will you tell me the way to the nearest 
village ? ” 

She got up as she was speaking, and put her hands to her 
bonnet to adjust it, and then laid hold of her basket. 

The man looked at her with a slow, bovine gaze, without 
giving her any answer, for some seconds. Then he turned 
away and walked towards the door of the hovel ; but it was 
not till he got there that he stood still, and, turning his 
shoulder half round towards her, said, — 

“Aw, I can show you the way to Norton, if you like. 
But what do you do gettin’ out o’ the highroad? ” he added, 

391 


ADAM BEDE 


with a tone of gruff reproof. “ Y 'ull be gettin’ into mis- 
chief, if you dooant mind.'’ 

Yes,” said Hetty, “ I won’t do it again. I ’ll keep in 
the road, if you ’ll be so good as show me how to get to it.” 

“ Why dooant you keep where there ’s finger-poasses an, 
folks to ax the way on ? ” the man said, still more gruffly. 
“ Anybody ’ud think you was a wild woman, an’ look at yer.” 

Hetty was frightened at this gruff old man, and still more 
at this last suggestion that she looked like a wild woman. 
As she followed him out of the hovel, she thought she would 
give him a sixpence for telling her the way, and then he 
would not suppose she was wild. As he stopped to point out 
the road to her, she put her hand in her pocket to get the 
sixpence ready; and when he was turning away without 
saying good-morning,” she held it out to him and said, 
“ Thank you ; will you please to take something for your 
trouble ? ” 

He looked slowly at the sixpence, and then said : “ I 

want none o’ your money. You ’d better take care on ’t, else 
you ’ll get it stool from yer, if you go trapesin’ about the 
fields like a man woman a-that-way.” 

The man left her without further speech, and Hetty held 
on her way. Another day had risen, and she must wander 
on. It was no use to think of drowning herself, — she could 
not do it, at least while she had money left to buy food, and 
strength to journey on. But the incident on her waking 
this morning heightened her dread of that time when her 
money would be all gone ; she would have to sell her basket 
and clothes then, and she would really look like a beggar or 
a wild woman, as the man had said. The passionate joy in 
life she had felt in the night, after escaping from the brink 
of the black cold death in the pool, was gone now. Life now, 
by the morning light, with the impression of that man’s 
hard, wondering look at her, was as full of dread as death, 
— it was worse ; it was a dread to which she felt chained, 
from which she shrank and shrank as she did from the black 
pool, and yet could find no refuge from it. 

She took out her money from her purse, and looked at it. 
She had still two-and-twenty shillings; it would serve her 
for many days more, or it would help her to get on faster 

392 


THE JOURNEY IN DESPAIR 


to Stonyshire, within reach of Dinah. The thought of Di. 
urged itself more strongly now, since the experience of ti. 
night had driven her shuddering imagination away from the 
pool. If it had been only going to Dinah, — if nobody be- 
sides Dinah would ever know, — Hetty could have made up 
her mind to go to her. The soft voice, the pitying eyes, 
would have drawn her. But afterwards the other people 
must know, and she could no more rush on that shame than 
she could rush on death. 

She must wander on and on, and wait for a lower depth 
of despair to give her courage. Perhaps death would come 
to her, for she was getting less and less able to bear the 
day’s weariness. And yet, — such is the strange action of our 
souls, drawing us by a lurking desire towards the very ends 
we dread, — Hetty, when she set out again from Norton, 
asked the straightest road northward towards Stonyshire, 
\ and kept it all that day. 

[ Poor w'andering Hetty, with the rounded childish face, 
and the hard, unloving, despairing soul looking out of it, — 
with the narrow heart and narrow thoughts, no room in 
them for any sorrows but her own, and tasting that sorrow 

I with the more intense bitterness ! My heart bleeds for her 
as I see her toiling along on her weary feet, or seated in a 
cart, with her eyes fixed vacantly on the road before her, 
never thinking or caring whither it tends, till hunger comes, 
and makes her desire that a village may be near. 

What will be the end? — the end of her objectless wan- 
dering, apart from all love, caring for human beings onl)? 

■ through her pride, clinging to life only as the hunted, 
wounded brute clings to it? 

God preserve you and me from being the beginners of 
such misery ! 


393 


ADAM BEDE 


CHAPTER XXXVIII. 


THE QUEST. 


HE first ten days after Hetty’s departure passed as 



X quietly as any other days with the family at the Hall 
Farm, and with Adam at his daily work. They had expected 
Hetty to stay away a week or ten days at least, perhaps a lit- 
tle longer if Dinah came back with her, because there might 
then be something to detain them at Snowfield. But when a 
fortnight had passed they began to feel a little surprise that 
Hetty did not return; she must surely have found it pleas- 
anter to be with Dinah than any one could have supposed. 
Adam, for his part, was getting very impatient to see her; 
and he resolved that if she did not appear the next day (Sat- 
urday), he would set out on Sunday morning to fetch her. 
There was no coach on a Sunday ; but by setting out before it 
was light, and perhaps getting a lift in a cart by the way, he 
would arrive pretty early at Snowfield, and bring back Hetty 
the next day, — Dinah too, if she were coming. It was quite 
time Hetty came home, and he would afford to lose his Mon- 
day for the sake of bringing her. 

His project was quite approved at the Farm when he went 
there on Saturday evening. Mrs. Poyser desired him em- 
phatically not to come back without Hetty, for she had been 
quite too long away, considering the things she had to get 
ready by the middle of March, and a week was surely enough 
for any one to go out for their health. As for Dinah, Mrs. 
Poyser had small hope of their bringing her, unless they 
could make her believe the folks at Hayslope were twice as 
miserable as the folks at Snowfield. Though,” said Mrs. 
Poyser, by way of conclusion, “ you might tell her she ’s got 
but one aunt left, and she ’s wasted pretty nigh to a shadder ; 
and we shall p’rhaps all be gone twenty mile further off her 
next Michaelmas, and shall die o’ broken hearts among 
strange folks, and leave the children fatherless and mother- 
less.” 

'' Nay, nay,” said Mr. Poyser, who certainly had the air of 
a man perfectly heart-whole, “ it isna so bad as that. Thee ’t 
looking rarely now, and getting flesh every day. But I ’d be 


394 


THE QUEST 


glad for Dinah t’ come, for she ’d help thee wi’ the little uns ; 
they took t’ her wonderful/’ 

So at daybreak, on Sunday, Adam set off. Seth went with 
him the first mile or two ; for the thought of Snowfield, and 
the possibility that Dinah might come again, made him 
restless, and the walk with Adam in the cold morning air, 
both in their best clothes, helped to give him-a sense of Sun- 
day calm. It was the last morning in February, with a low 
gray sky, and a slight hoar-frost on the green border of the 
road and on the black hedges. They heard the gurgling of 
the full brooklet hurrying down the hill, and the faint twit- 
tering of the early birds ; for they walked in silence, though 
with a pleased sense of companionship. 

“ Good-by, lad,” said Adam, laying his hand on Seth’s 
shoulder, and looking at him affectionately as they were 
about to part. “I wish thee wast going all the way wi’ me, 
and as happy as I am.” 

“ I ’m content, Addy, I ’m content,” said Seth, cheerfully. 
“ I ’ll be an old bachelor, belike, and make a fuss wi’ thy 
children.” 

They turned away from each other; and Seth walked lei- 
surely homeward, mentally repeating one of his favourite 
hymns, — he was very fond of hymns : — 

‘‘ Dark and cheerless is the morn 
Unaccompanied by thee; 

Joyless is the day’s return 
Till thy mercy’s beams I see, — 

Till thou inward light impart. 

Glad my eyes and warm my heart. 

‘‘ Visit, then, this soul of mine. 

Pierce the gloom of sin and grief; 

Fill me. Radiancy Divine, 

Scatter all my unbelief; 

More and more thyself display. 

Shining to the perfect day.” 

Adam walked much faster ; and any one coming along the 
Oakbourne road at sunrise that morning must have had a 
pleasant sight in this tall broad-chested man, striding along 
with a carriage as upright and firm as any soldier’s, glancing 

395 


ADAM BEDE 


with keen, glad eyes at the dark-blue hills as they began to 
show themselves on his way. Seldom in Adam’s life had his 
face been so free from any cloud of anxiety as it was this 
morning; and this freedom from care, as is usual with con- 
structive, practical minds like his, made him all the more ob- 
servant of the objects round him, and all the more ready to 
gather suggestions from them towards his own favourite 
plans and ingenious contrivances. His happy love — the 
knowledge that his steps were carrying him nearer and near- 
er to Hetty, who was so soon to be his — was to his thoughts 
'what the sweet morning air was to his sensations; it gave 
him a consciousness of well-being that made activity delight- 
ful. Every now and then there was a rush of more intense 
feeling towards her, which chased away other images than 
Hetty ; and along with that would come a wondering thank- 
fulness that all this happiness was given to him, — that this 
life of ours had such sweetness in it. For Adam had a de- 
vout mind, though he was perhaps rather impatient of devout 
words ; and his tenderness lay very close to his reverence, so 
that the one could hardly be stirred without the other. But 
after feeling had welled up and poured itself out in this way, 
busy thought would come back with the greater vigour ; and 
this morning it was intent on schemes by which the roads 
might be improved that were so imperfect all through the 
country, and on picturing all the benefits that might come 
from the exertions of a single country gentleman, if he would 
set himself to getting the roads made good in his own dis- 
trict. 

It seemed a very short walk, — the ten miles to Oak- 
bourne, that pretty town within sight of the blue hills, where 
he breakfasted. After this the country grew barer and barer, 
— no more rolling woods, no more wide-branching trees 
near frequent homesteads, no more bushy hedgerows ; but 
gray stone walls intersecting the meagre pastures, and dis- 
mal, wide-scattered, gray stone houses on broken lands 
where mines had been and were no longer. 

“ A hungry land,” said Adam to himself. “ I ’d rather go 
south ’ard, where they say it ’s as flat as a table, than come to 
live here ; though, if Dinah likes to live in a country where 
she can be the most comfort to folks, she ’s i’ the right to 

396 


THE QUEST 


live o’ this side ; for she must look as if she ’d come straight 
from heaven, like th’ angels in the desert, to strengthen them 
as ha’ got nothing t’ eat.” And when at last he came in sight 
of Snowfield, he thought it looked like a town that was fel- 
low to the country,” though the stream through the valley 
where the great mill stood gave a pleasant greenness to the 
lower fields. The town lay grim, stony, and unsheltered, up 
the side of a steep hill ; and Adam did not go forward to it 
at present, for Seth had told him where to find Dinah. It 
was at a thatched cottage outside the town, a little way from 
the mill — an old cottage, standing sideways towards the 
road, with a little bit of potato-ground before it. Here 
Dinah lodged with an elderly couple ; and if she and Hetty 
happened to be out, Adam could learn where they were gone, 
or when they would be at home again. Dinah might be out 
on some preaching errand, and perhaps she would have left 
Hetty at home. Adam could not help hoping this ; and as he 
recognized the cottage by the roadside before him, there 
shone out in his face that involuntary smile which belongs 
to the expectation of a near joy. 

He hurried his step along the narrow causeway, and 
rapped at the door. It was opened by a very clean old wom- 
an, with a slow palsied shake of the head. 

“ Is Dinah Morris at home ? ” said Adam. 

''Eh? . . . no,” said the old woman, looking up at this 
tall stranger with a wonder that made her slower of speech 
than usual. "Will you please to come in?” she added, re- 
tiring from the door, as if recollecting herself. " Why, ye ’re 
brother to the young man as come afore, arena ye ? ” 

" Yes,” said Adam, entering. " That was Seth Bede. I ’m 
his brother Adam. He told me to give his respects to you 
and your good master.” 

" Ay, the same t’ him. He was a gracious young man ; an’ 

( ye feature him, on’y ye ’re darker. Sit ye down i’ th’ arm- 
^ chair. My man isna come home from meeting.” 

Adam sat down patiently, not liking to hurry the shaking 
' old woman with questions, but looking eagerly towards the 
narrow twisting stairs in one corner ; for he thought it was 
I possible Hetty might have heard his voice, and would come 
down then. 


397 


1 


ADAM BEDE 


So you’re come to see Dinah Morris?” said the old wom- 
an, standing opposite to him. “ An’ you didna know she was 
away from home, then ? ” 

‘‘ No,” said Adam ; “ but I thought it likely she might be 
away, seeing as it ’s Sunday. But the other young woman, 
— is she at home, or gone along with Dinah ?” 

The old woman looked at Adam with a bewildered air. 

“Gone along wi’ her?” she said. “Eh, Dinah’s gone to 
Leeds, a big town ye may ha’ beared on, where there ’s a 
many o’ the Lord’s people. She ’s been gone sin’ Friday was 
a fortnight ; they sent her the money for her journey. You 
may see her room here,” she went on, opening a door, and 
not noticing the effect of her words on Adam. He rose and 
followed her, and darted an eager glance into the little room, 
with its narrow bed, the portrait of Wesley on the wall, and 
the few books lying on the large Bible. He had had an irra- 
tional hope that Hetty might be there. He could not speak 
in the first moment after seeing that the room was empty ; 
an undefined fear had seized him, — something had happened 
to Hetty on the journey. Still the old woman was so slow of 
speech and apprehension that Hetty might be at Snowfield 
after all. 

“ It ’s a pity ye didna know,” she said. “ Have ye come 
from your own country o’ purpose to see her ? ” 

“ But Hetty — Hetty Sorrel,” said Adam, abruptly ; 
“ where is shef ” 

“ I know nobody by that name,” said the old woman, won- 
deringly. “ Is it anybody ye ’ve beared on at Snowfield? ” 

“ Did there come no young woman here — very young 
and pretty — Friday was a fortnight, to see Dinah Morris? ” 

“ Nay ; I ’n seen no young woman.” 

“Think; are you quite sure? A girl, eighteen years old, 
with dark eyes and dark curly hair, and a fed cloak on, and 
a basket on her arm? You couldn’t forget her if vou saw 
her.” 

“ Nay ; Friday was a fortnight, — it was the day as Dinah 
went away, — there come nobody. There ’s ne’er been no- 
body asking for her till you come, for the folks about know 
as she ’s gone. Eh dear, eh dear, is there summat the mat- 
ter?” 


398 


THE QUEST 


The old woman had seen the ghastly look of fear in 
Adam’s face. But he was not stunned or confounded; he 
was thinking eagerly where he could inquire about Hetty. 

“Yes; a young woman started from our country to see 
Dinah, Friday was a fortnight. I came to fetch her back. 
I ’m afraid something has happened to her. I can’t stop. 
Good-by.” 

He hastened out of the cottage ; and the old woman fol- 
lowed him to the gate, watching him sadly with her shaking 
head, as he almost ran towards the town. He was going to 
inquire at the place where the Oakbourne coach stopped. 

No; no young woman like Hetty had been seen there. 
Had any accident happened to the coach a fortnight ago? 
No. And there was no coach to take him back to Oak- 
bourne that day. Well, he would walk; he couldn’t stay 
here, in wretched inaction. But the innkeeper, seeing that 
Adam was in great anxiety, and entering into this new inci- 
dent with the eagerness of a man who passes a great deal of 
time with his hands in his pockets looking into an obstinately 
monotonous street, offered to take him back to Oakbourne 
in his own “ taxed cart ” this very evening. It was not five 
o’clock ; there was plenty of time for Adam to take a meal, 
and yet to get to Oakbourne before ten o’clock. The inn- 
keeper declared that he really wanted to go to Oakbourne, 
and might as well go to-night ; he should have all Monday 
before him then. Adam, after making an ineffectual attempt 
to eat, put the food in his pocket, and drinking a draught of 
ale, declared himself ready to set off. As they approached 
the cottage, it occurred to him that he would do well to learn 
from the old woman where Dinah was to be found in Leeds : 
if there was trouble at the Hall Farm, — he only half admit- 
ted the foreboding that there would be, — the Poysers might 
like to send for Dinah. But Dinah had not left any address ; 
and the old woman, whose memory for names was infirm, 
could not recall the name of the “ blessed woman ” who was 
Dinah’s chief friend in the Society at Leeds. 

During that long, long journey in the taxed cart there was 
time for all the conjectures of importunate fear and strug- 
gling hope. In the very first shock of discovering that Hetty 
had not been to Snowfield, the thought of Arthur had darted 


399 


ADAM BEDE 


through Adam like a sharp pang ; but he tried for some time 
to ward off its return by busying himself with modes of ac- 
counting for the alarming fact, quite apart from that intol- 
erable thought. Some accident had happened. Hetty had, 
by some strange chance, got into a wrong vehicle from Oak- 
bourne ; she had been taken ill, and did not want to frighten 
them*by letting them know. But this frail fence of vague 
improbabilities was soon hurled down by a rush of distinct 
agonizing fears. Hetty had been deceiving herself in think- 
ing that she could love and marry him ; she had been loving 
Arthur all the while, and now, in her desperation at the 
nearness of their marriage, she had run away. And she was 
gone to him. The old indignation and jealousy rose again, 
and prompted the suspicion that Arthur had been dealing 
falsely, — had written to Hetty, had tempted her to come to 
him, being unwilling, after all, that she should belong to 
another man besides himself. Perhaps the whole thing had 
been contrived by him, and he had given her directions how 
to follow him to Ireland; for Adam knew that Arthur had 
been gone thither three weeks ago, having recently learned 
it at the Chase. Every sad look of Hetty's, since she had 
been engaged to Adam, returned upon him now with all the 
exaggeration of painful retrospect. He had been foolishly 
sanguine and confident. The poor thing had n’t perhaps 
known her own mind for a long while ; had thought that she 
could forget Arthur; had been momentarily drawn towards 
the man who offered her a protecting, faithful love. He 
could n’t bear to blame her ; she never meant to cause him 
this dreadful pain. The blame lay with that man who had 
selfishly played with her heart, — had perhaps even deliber- 
ately lured her away. 

At Oakbourne, the ostler at the Royal Oak remembered 
such a young woman as Adam described getting out of the 
Treddleston coach more than a fortnight ago, — wasn’t 
likely to forget such a pretty lass as that in a hurry, — was 
sure she had not gone on by the Buxton coach that went 
through Snowfield, but had lost sight of her while he went 
away with the horses, and had never set eyes on her again. 
Adam then went straight to the house from which the Stoni- 
ton coach started. Stoniton was the most obvious place for 

400 


THE QUEST 


Hetty to go to first, whatever might be her destination, for 
she would hardly venture on any but the chief coach-roads. 
She had been noticed here too, and was remembered to have 
sat on the box by the coachman ; but the coachman could 
not be seen, for another man had been driving on that road 
in his stead the last three or four days ; he could probably be 
seen at Stoniton, through inquiry at the inn where the coach 
put up. So the anxious, heart-stricken Adam must of neces- 
sity wait and try to rest till morning, — nay, till eleven 
o’clock, when the coach started. 

At Stoniton another delay occurred, for the old coachman 
who had driven Hetty would not be in the town again till 
night. When he did come he remembered Hetty well, and 
remembered his own joke addressed to her, quoting it many 
times to Adam, and observing with equal frequency that he 
thought there was something more than common, because 
Hetty had not laughed when he joked her. But he declared, 
as the people had done at the inn, that he had lost sight of 
Hetty directly she got down. Part of the next morning was 
consumed in inquiries at every house in the town from which 
a coach started, — all in vain, for you know Hetty did not 
start from Stoniton by coach, but on foot in the gray morn- 
ing, — and then in walking out to the first toll-gates on the 
different lines of road, in the forlorn hope of finding some 
recollection of her there. No, she was not to be traced any 
farther; and the next hard task for Adam was to go home, 
and carry the wretched tidings to the Hall Farm. As to what 
he should do beyond that, he had come to two distinct reso- 
lutions amidst the tumult of thought and feeling which was 
going on within him while he went to and fro. He would 
not mention what he knew of Arthur Donnithorne’s behav- 
iour to Hetty till there was a clear necessity for it ; it was still 
possible Hetty might come back, and the disclosure might 
be an injury or an offence to her. And as soon as he had 
been home, and done what was necessary there to prepare 
for his further absence, he would start off to Ireland ; if he 
found no trace of Hetty on the road, he would go straight to 
Arthur Donnithorne, and make himself certain how far he 
was acquainted with her movements. Several times the 
thought occurred to him that he would consult Mr. Irwine ; 


ADAM BEDE 


but that would be useless unless he told him all, and so be- 
trayed the secret about Arthur. It seems strange that Adam, 
in the incessant occupation of his mind about Hetty, should 
never have alighted on the probability that she had gone to 
Windsor, ignorant that Arthur was no longer there. Per- 
haps the reason was that he could not conceive Hetty’s 
throwing herself on Arthur uncalled ; he imagined no cause 
that could have driven her to such a step, after that letter 
written in August. There were but two alternatives in his 
mind : either Arthur had written to her again and enticed her 
away, or she had simply fled from her approaching marriage 
with himself, because she found, after all, she could not love 
him well enough, and yet was afraid of her friends’ anger if 
she retracted. 

With this last determination on his mind, of going straight 
to Arthur, the thought that he had spent two days in in- 
quiries which had proved to be almost useless was torturing 
to Adam ; and yet, since he would not tell the Poysers his 
conviction as to where Hetty was gone, or his intention to 
follow her thither, he must be able to say to them that he 
had traced her as far as possible. 

It was after twelve o’clock on Tuesday night when Adam 
reached Treddleston ; and unwilling to disturb his mother 
and Seth and also to encounter their questions at that hour, 
he threw himself without undressing on a bed at the “Wagon 
Overthrown,” and slept hard from pure weariness. Not more 
than four hours, however ; for before five o’clock he set out 
on his way home in the faint morning twilight. He always 
kept a key of the workshop door in his pocket, so that he 
could let himself in ; and he wished to enter without awaking 
his mother, for he was anxious to avoid telling her the 
new trouble himself by seeing Seth first, and asking him to 
tell her when it should be necessary. He walked gently 
along the yard, and turned the key gently in the door ; but, 
as he expected. Gyp, who lay in the workshop, gave a sharp 
bark. It subsided when he saw Adam holding up his finger 
at him to impose silence ; and in his dumb, tailless joy he 
must content himself with rubbing his body against his 
master’s legs. 

Adam was too heart-sick to take notice of Gyp’s fondling. 


402 


THE QUEST 


He threw himself on the bench, and stared dully at the wood 
and the signs of work around him, wondering if he should 
ever come to feel pleasure in them again ; while Gyp, dimly 
aware that there was something wrong with his master, laid 
his rough gray head on Adam’s knee, and wrinkled his brows 
to look up at him. Hitherto, since Sunday afternoon, Adam 
had been constantly among strange people and in strange 
places, having no associations with the details of his daily 
life ; and now that by the light of this new morning he was 
come back to his home, and surrounded by the familiar ob- 
jects that seemed forever robbed of their charm, the reality 
— the hard, inevitable reality — of his troubles pressed upon 
him with a new weight. Right before him was an unfinished 
chest of drawers, which he had been making in Spare mo- 
ments for Hetty’s use, when his home should be hers. 

Seth had not heard Adam’s entrance, but he had been 
roused by Gyp’s bark; and Adam heard him moving about 
in the room above, dressing himself. Seth’s first thoughts 
were about his brother ; he would come home to-day, surely, 
for the business would be wanting him sadly by to-morrow ; 
but it was pleasant to think he had had a longer holiday than 
he had expected. And Dinah would come too? Seth felt 
that that was the greatest happiness he could look forward to 
for himself, though he had no hope left that she would ever 
love him well enough to marry him ; but he had often said to 
himself, it was better to be Dinah’s friend and brother than 
any other woman’s husband. If he could but be always near 
her, instead of living so far off ! 

He came downstairs and opened the inner door leading 
from the kitchen into the workshop, intending to let out 
Gyp ; but he stood still in the doorway, smitten with a sud- 
den shock at the sight of Adam seated listlessly on the bench, 
pale, unwashed, with sunken blank eyes, almost like a drunk- 
ard in the morning. But Seth felt in an instant what the 
marks meant, — not drunkenness, but some great calamity. 
Adam looked up at him without speaking ; and Seth moved 
forward towards the bench, himself trembling so that speech 
did not come readily. 

God have mercy on us, Addy ! ” he said, in a low voice, 
sitting down on the bench beside Adam ; “ what is it ? ” 

403 


ADAM BEDE 


Adam was unable to speak. The strong man, accustomed 
to suppress the signs of sorrow, had felt his heart swell like a 
child’s at this first approach of sympathy. He fell on Seth’s 
neck and sobbed. 

Seth was prepared for the worst now ; for even in his recol- 
lections of their boyhood, Adam had never sobbed before. 

Is it death, Adam ? Is she dead ? ” he asked, in a low 
tone, when Adam raised his head and was recovering himself. 

No, lad ; but she ’s gone, — gone away from us. She ’s 
never been to Snowfield. Dinah ’s been gone to Leeds ever 
since last Friday was a fortnight, the very day Hetty set out. 
I can’t find out where she went after she got to Stoniton.” 

Seth was silent from utter astonishment ; he knew nothing 
that could suggest to him a reason for Hetty’s going away. 

“ Hast any notion what she ’s done it for? ” he said at last. 

“ She can’t ha’ loved me ; she did n’t like our marriage 
when it came nigh, — that must be it,” said Adam. He had 
determined to mention no further reason. 

'' I hear mother stirring,” said Seth. “ Must we tell her? ” 

“ No, not yet,” said Adam, rising from the bench, and 
pushing the hair from his face, as if he wanted to rouse him- 
self. I can’t have her told yet ; and I must set out on an- 
other journey, directly after I ’ve been to the village and th’ 
Hall Farm. I can’t tell thee where I ’m going, and thee 
must say to her I ’m gone on business as nobody is to know 
anything about. I *11 go and wash myself now\” Adam 
moved towards the door of the workshop ; but after a step 
or two he turned round, and, meeting Seth’s eyes with a 
calm, sad glance, he said, “ I must take all the money out o’ 
the tin box, lad ; but if anything happens to me, all the rest ’ll 
be thine, to take care o’ mother with.” 

Seth was pale and trembling ; he felt there was some terri- 
ble secret under all this. Brother,” he said faintly, — he 
never called Adam “ brother ” except in solemn moments, — 
“ I don’t believe you ’ll do anything as you can’t ask God’s 
blessing on.” 

“ Nay, lad,” said Adam, “ don’t be afraid. I ’m for doing 
nought but what ’s a man’s duty.” 

The thought that if he betrayed his trouble to his mother 
she would only distress him by words, half of blundering 


404 


THE QUEST 


affection, half of irrepressible triumph that Hetty proved 
as unfit to be his wife as she had always foreseen, brought 
back some of his habitual firmness and self-command. He 
had felt ill on his journey home, — he told her when she 
came down, — had stayed all night at Treddleston for that 
reason ; and a bad headache, that still hung about him this 
morning, accounted for his paleness and heavy eyes. 

He determined to go to the village, in the first place ; at- 
tend to his business for an hour, and give notice to Burge of 
his being obliged to go on a journey, which he must beg him 
not to mention to any one ; for he wished to avoid going to 
the Hall Farm near breakfast-time, when the children and 
servants would be in the house-place, and there must be ex- 
clamations in their hearing about his having returned with- 
out Hetty. He waited until the clock struck nine before he 
left the workyard at the village, and set off, through the 
fields, towards the Farm. It was an immense relief to him, 
as he came near the Home Close, to see Mr. Poyser ad- 
vancing towards him, for this would spare him the pain of 
going to the house. Mr. Poyser was walking briskly this 
March morning, with a sense of spring business on his mind ; 
he was going to cast the master’s eye on the shoeing of a 
new cart-horse, carrying his spud as a useful companion by 
the way. His surprise was great when he caught sight of 
Adam, but he was not a man given to presentiments of evil. 

Why, Adam, lad, is ’t you ? Have ye been all this time 
away, and not brought the lasses back, after all ? Where are 
they?” 

'' No, I Ve not brought ’em,” said Adam, turning round, 
to indicate that he wished to walk back with Mr. Poyser. 

“ Why,” said Martin, looking with sharper attention at 
Adam, “ ye look bad. Is there anything happened ? ” 

“ Yes,” said Adam, heavily. “ A sad thing ’s happened. 
I didna find Hetty at Snowfield.” 

Mr. Poyser’s good-natured face showed signs of troubled 
astonishment. “ Not find her? What ’s happened to her? ” 
he said, his thoughts flying at once to bodily accident. 

“ That I can’t tell, whether anything ’s happened to her. 
She never went to Snowfield, — she took the coach to Stoni- 


405 


ADAM BEDE 


ton, but I can’t learn nothing of her after she got down from 
the Stoniton coach.” 

“ Why, you donna mean she ’s run away ? ” said Martin, 
standing still, so puzzled and bewildered that the fact did 
not yet make itself felt as a trouble by him. 

“ She must ha’ done,” said Adam. “ She did n’t like our 
marriage when it came to the point, — that must be it. 
She ’d mistook her feelings.” 

Martin was silent for a minute or two, looking on the 
ground, and rooting up the grass with his spud, without 
knowing what he was doing. His usual slowness was always 
trebled when the subject of speech was painful. At last he 
looked up, right in Adam’s face, saying, — 

Then she didna deserve t’ ha’ ye, my lad. An’ I feel T 
fault myself, for she was my niece, and I was allays hot for 
her marr’ing ye. There ’s no amends I can make ye, lad, — 
the more ’s the pity ; it ’s a sad cut-up for ye, I doubt.” 

Adam could say nothing; and Mr. Poyser, after pursuing 
his walk for a little while, went on : — 

“ I ’ll be bound she ’s gone after trying to get a lady’s- 
maid’s place, for she ’d got that in her head half a year ago, 
and wanted me to gi’ my consent. But I ’d thought better 
on her,” he added, shaking his head slowly and sadly, — 

I ’d thought better on her nor to look for this, after she ’d 
gi’en y’ her word, an ’everything been got ready.” 

Adam had the strongest motives for encouraging this sup- 
position in Mr. Poyser, and he even tried to believe that it 
might possibly be true. He had no warrant for the certainty 
that she was gone to Arthur. 

“ It was better it should be so,” he said, as quietly as he 
could, if she felt she could n’t like me for a husband. Better 
run away before than repent after. I hope you won’t look 
harshly on her if she comes back, as she may do if she finds 
it hard to get on away from home.” 

“ I canna look on her as I ’ve done before,” said Martin, 
decisively. She ’s acted bad by you and by all of us. But 
I ’ll not turn my back on her ; she ’s but a young un, and it ’s 
the first harm I ’ve knowed on her. It ’ll be a hard job for 
me to tell her aunt. Why didna Dinah come back wi’ ye ? — 
she ’d ha’ helped to pacify her aunt a bit.” 

406 


THE QUEST 


Dinah was n’t at Snowfield. She ’s been gone to Leeds 
this fortnight ; and I could n’t learn from th’ old woman any 
direction where she is at Leeds, else I should ha’ brought it 
>ou.” 

She ’d a deal better be staying wi’ her own kin,” said 
Mr. Poyser, indignantly, “than going preaching among 
strange folk a-that’n.” 

“ I must leave you now, Mr. Poyser,” said Adam, “ for 
I ’ve a deal to see to.” 

“ Ay, you ’d best be after your business, and I must tell 
the missis when I go home. It ’s a hard job.” 

“ But,” said Adam, “ I beg particular, you ’ll keep whaf ’s 
happened quiet for a week or two. I ’ve not told my mother 
yet, and there ’s no knowing how things may turn out.” 

“ Ay, ay ; least said, soonest mended. We ’n no need to 
say why the match is broke off, an’ we may hear of her after 
a bit. Shake hands wi’ me, lad; I wish I could make thee 
amends.” 

There was something in Martin Poyser’s throat at that 
moment which caused him to bring out those scanty words 
in rather a broken fashion. Yet Adam knew what they 
meant all the better; and the two honest men grasped each 
other’s hard hands in mutual understanding. 

There was nothing now to hinder Adam from setting off. 
He had told Seth to go to the Chase and leave a message for 
the Squire, saying that Adam Bede had been obliged to 
start off suddenly on a journey, — and to say as much and 
no more to any one else who made inquiries about him. If 
the Poysers learned that he was going away again, Adam 
knew they would infer that he was gone in search of Hetty. 

He had intended to go right on his way from the Hall 
Farm ; but now the impulse which had frequently visited him 
before — to go to Mr. Irwine, and make a confidant of him 
— recurred with the new force which belongs to a last op- 
portunity. He was about to start on a long journey, — a 
difficult one, by sea, — and no soul would know where he 
was gone. If anything happened to him, or if he absolutely 
needed help in any matter concerning Hetty? Mr. Irwine 
was to be trusted ; and the feeling which made Adam shrink 
from telling anything which was her secret must give way 

407 


ADAM BEDE 


before the need there was that she should have some one 
else besides himself who would be prepared to defend her in 
the worst extremity. Towards Arthur, even though he might 
have incurred no new guilt, Adam felt that he was not bound 
to keep silence when Hetty’s interest called on him to speak. 

“ I must do it,” said Adam, when these thoughts, which 
had spread themselves through hours of his sad journeying, 
now rushed upon him in an instant, like a wave that had 
been slowly gathering ; “ it ’s the right thing. I can’t stand 
alone in this way any longer.” 


CHAPTER XXXIX. 


THE TIDINGS. 


DAM turned his face towards Broxton and walked with 



jr\ his swiftest stride, looking at his watch with the fear 
that Mr. Irwine might be gone out — hunting, perhaps. 
The fear and haste together produced a state of strong ex- 
citement before he reached the Rectory gate; and outside 
it he saw the deep marks of a recent hoof on the gravel. 

But the hoofs were turned towards the gate, not away 
from it; and though there was a horse against the stable 
door, it was not Mr. Irwine’s : it had evidently had a jour- 
ney this morning, and must belong to some one who had 
come on business. Mr. Irwine was at home then ; but Adam 
could hardly find breath and calmness to tell Carroll that 
he wanted to speak to the Rector. The double suffering of 
certain and uncertain sorrow had begun to shake the strong 
man. The butler looked at him wonderingly, as he threw 
himself on a bench in the passage and stared absently at the 
clock on the opposite wall ; the master had somebody with 
him, he said, but he heard the study door open, — the 
stranger seemed to be coming out, and as Adam was in a 
hurry, he would let the master know at once. 

Adam sat looking at the clock. The minute-hand was 
hurrying along the last five minutes to ten, with a loud, 
hard, indifferent tick; and Adam watched the movement 
and listened to the sound as if he had had some reason for 


408 


THE TIDINGS 


doing so. In our times of bitter suffering there are almost 
always these pauses, when our consciousness is benumbed 
to everything but some trivial perception or sensation. It 
is as if semi-idiocy came to give us rest from the memory 
and the dread which refuse to leave us in our sleep. 

Carroll, coming back, recalled Adam to the sense of his 
burthen. He was to go into the study immediately. I 
can’t think what that strange person ’s come about,” the 
butler added, from mere incontinence of remark, as he pre- 
ceded Adam to the door ; “ he ’s gone i’ the dining-room. 
And master looks unaccountable, — as if he was frightened.” 
Adam took no notice of the words ; he could not care about 
other people’s business. But when he entered the study and 
looked in Mr. Irwine’s face, he felt in an instant that there 
was a new expression in it, strangely different from the 
warm friendliness it had always worn for him before. A 
letter lay open on the table, and Mr. Irwine’s hand was on it ; 
but the changed glance he cast on Adam could not be owing 
entirely to preoccupation with some disagreeable business, 
for he was looking eagerly towards the door, as if Adaln’s 
entrance were a matter of poignant anxiety to him. 

“ You want to speak to me, Adam,” he said, in that low, 
constrainedly quiet tone which a man uses when he is de- 
termined to suppress agitation. “ Sit down here.” He 
pointed to a chair just opposite to him, at no more than a 
yard’s distance from his own ; and Adam sat down with a 
sense that this cold manner of Mr. Irwine’s gave an addi- 
tional unexpected difficulty to his disclosure. But when 
Adam had made up his mind to a measure, he was not the 
man to renounce it for any but imperative reasons. 

'' I come to you, sir,” he said, '' as the gentleman I look 
up to most of anybody. I ’ve something very painful to tell 
you, — something as it ’ll pain you to hear as well as me to 
tell. But if I speak o’ the wrong other people have done, 
you ’ll see I did n’t speak till I ’d good reason.” 

Mr. Irwine nodded slowly, and Adam went on rather 
tremulously, — 

You was t’ ha’ married me and Hetty Sorrel, you know, 
sir, o’ the 15th o’ this month. I thought she loved me, and 

409 


ADAM BEDE 


1 was th’ happiest man i' the parish. But a dreadful blow ’s 
come upon me.^’ 

Mr. Irwine started up from his chair, as if involuntarily; 
but then, determined to control himself, walked to the win- 
dow and looked out. 

“ She ’s gone away, sir, and we don’t know where. She 
said she was going to Snowfield o’ Friday was a fortnight, 
and I went last Sunday to fetch her back ; but she ’d never 
been there, and she took the coach to Stoniton, and beyond 
that I can’t trace her. But now I ’m going a long journey 
to look for her, and I can’t trust t’ anybody but you where 
I ’m going.” 

Mr. Irwine came back from the window and sat down. 

“ Have you no idea of the reason why she went away? ” 
he said. 

“ It ’s plain enough she did n’t want to marry me, sir,” 
said Adam. “ She did n’t like it when it came so near. But 
that is n’t all, I doubt. There ’s something else I must tell 
you, sir. There ’s somebody else concerned besides me.” 

A gleam of something — it was almost like relief or joy 
— came across the eager anxiety of Mr. Irwine’s face at that 
moment. Adam was looking on the ground, and paused a 
little; the next words were hard to speak. But when he 
went on, he lifted up his head and looked straight at Mr. 
Irwine. He would do the thing he had resolved to do, with- 
out flinching. 

“You know who’s the man I’ve reckoned my greatest 
friend,” he said, “ and used to be proud to think as I should 
pass my life i’ working for him, and had felt so ever since we 
were lads — ” 

Mr. Irwine, as if all self-control had forsaken him, grasped 
Adam’s arm^, which lay on the table, and clutching it tightly 
like a man in pain; said, with pale lips and a low hurried 
voice, — 

“ No, Adam, no, — don ’t say it, for God’s sake ! ” 

Adam, surprised ’at the violence of Mr. Irwine’s feeling, 
repented of the words that had passed his lips, and sat in 
distressed silence. The grasp on his arm gradually relaxed, 
and Mr. Irwine threw himself back in his chair, “ Go on, — 
I must know it.” 


410 


THE TIDINGS 


“ That man played with Hetty’s feelings, and behaved to 
her as he ’d no right to do to a girl in her station o’ life, — 
made her presents, and used to go and meet her out a-walk- 
ing. I found it out only two days before he went away, — 
found him a-kissing her as they were parting in the Grove. 
There ’d been nothing said between me and Hetty then, 
though I ’d loved her for a long while, and she knew it. But 
I reproached him with his wrong actions, and words and 
blows passed betw'een us ; and he said solemnly to me, after 
that, as it had been all nonsense, and no more than a bit o’ 
flirting. But I made him write a letter to tell Hetty he ’d 
meant nothing ; for I saw clear enough, sir, by several things 
as I had n’t understood at the time, as he ’d got hold of her 
heart, and I thought she ’d belike go on thinking of him, 
and never come to love another man as wanted to marry 
her. And I gave her the letter, and- she seemed to bear it all 
after a while better than I ’d expected . . . and she behaved 
kinder and kinder to me ... I dare say she did n’t know 
her own feelings then, poor thing, and they came back upon 
her when it was too late ... I don’t want to blame her 
... I can’t think as she meant to deceive me. But I was 
encouraged to think she loved me, and — you know the 
rest, sir. But it ’s on my mind as he ’s been false to me, and 
’ticed her away, and she ’s gone to him — and I ’m going 
now to see; for I can never go to work again till I know 
what ’s become of her.” 

During Adam’s narrative Mr. Irwine had had time to re- 
cover his self-mastery in spite of the painful thoughts that 
crowded upon him. It was a bitter remembrance to him 
now, — that morning when Arthur breakfasted with him, 
and seemed as if he were on the verge of a confession. It 
was plain enough now what he had wanted to confess. And 
if their words had taken another turn ... if he himself had 
been less fastidious about intruding on another man’s se- 
crets ... it was cruel to think how thin a film had shut out 
rescue from all this guilt and misery. He saw the whole 
history now by that terrible illumination which the present 
sheds back upon the past. But every other feeling as it 
rushed upon him was thrown into abeyance by pity, — deep, 
respectful pity, for the man who sat before him, — already 

411 


ADAM BEDE 


so bruised, going forth with sad, blind resignedness to an 
unreal sorrow, while a real one was close upon him, too far 
beyond the range of common trial for him ever to have 
feared it. His own agitation was quelled by a certain awe 
that comes over us in the presence of a great anguish ; for 
the anguish he must inflict on Adam was already present to 
him. Again he put his hand on the arm that lay on the 
table, but very gently this time, as he said solemnly, — 

“ Adam, my dear friend, you have had some hard trials 
in your life. You can bear sorrow manfully, as well as act 
manfully. God requires both tasks at our hands. And 
there is a heavier sorrow coming upon you than any you 
have yet known. But you are not guilty, — you have not 
the worst of all sorrows. God help him who has ! ” 

The two pale faces looked at each other : in Adam’s there 
was trembling suspense ; in Mr. Irwine’s, hesitating, shrink- 
ing pity. But he went on. 

“ I have had news of Hetty this morning. She is not gone 
to him. She is in Stonyshire, — at Stoniton.” 

Adam started up from his chair, as if he thought he could 
have leaped to her that moment. But Mr. Irwine laid hold 
of his arm again, and said persuasively, ‘‘ Wait, Adam, 
wait.” So he sat down. 

She is in a very unhappy position, — one which will 
make it worse for you to find her, my poor friend, than to 
have lost her forever.” 

Adam’s lips moved tremulously, but no sound came. They 
moved again, and he whispered, “ Tell me.” 

“ She has been arrested . . . she is in prison.” 

It was as if an insulting blow had brought back the spirit 
of resistance into Adam. The blood rushed to his face, and 
he said loudly and sharplv, — 

“For what?” 

“ For a great crime, — the murder of her child.” 

“ It can’t be! ” Adam almost shouted, starting up from 
his chair, and making a stride towards the door; but he 
turned round again, setting his back against the bookcase, 
and looking fiercely at Mr. Irwine. “ It is n’t possible. She 
never had a child. She can’t be guilty. Who says it ? ” 

412 


THE TIDINGS 


God grant she may be innocent, Adam. We can still 
hope she is.” 

“But who says she is guilty?” said Adam, violently. 
“ Tell me everything.” 

“ Here is a letter from the magistrate before whom she 
was taken, and the constable who arrested her is in the 
dining-room. She will not confess her name, or where she 
comes from ; but I fear, I fear there can be no doubt it is 
Hetty. The description of her person corresponds, only that 
she is said to look very pale and ill. She had a small red- 
leather pocket-book in her pocket with two names written 
in it, — one at the beginning, ' Hetty Sorrel, Hayslope,’ and 
the other near the end, ^ Dinah Morris, Snowfield.’ She will 
not say which is her own name, — she denies everything, 
and will answer no questions; and application has been 
made to me, as a magistrate, that I may take measures for 
identifying her, for it was thought probable that the name 
which stands first is her own name.” 

“ But what proof have they got against her, if it is 
Hetty ? ” said Adam, still violently, with an effort that 
seemed to shake his whole frame. “ I ’ll not believe it. It 
could n’t ha’ been, and none of us know it.” 

“ Terrible proof that she was under the temptation to 
commit the crime ; but we have room to hope that she did 
not really commit it. Try and read that letter, Adam.” 

Adam took the letter between his shaking hands, and 
tried to fix his eyes steadily on it. Mr. Irwine meanwhile 
went out to give some orders. When he came back, Adam’s 
eyes were still on the first page, — he could n’t read, — he 
could not put the words together, and make out what they 
meant. He threw it down at last, and clenched his fist. 

“ It ’s his doing,” he said : “ if there ’s been any crime, it ’s 
at his door, not at hers. He taught her to deceive, — he de- 
ceived me first. Let ’em put him on his trial, — let him 
stand in court beside her, and I ’ll tell ’em how he got hold 
of her heart, and ’ticed her t’ evil, and then lied to me. Is 
he to go free, while they lay all the punishment on her . . . 
so weak and young? ” 

The image called up by these last words gave a new di- 
rection to poor Adam’s maddened feelings. He was silent, 

413 


ADAM BEDE 


looking at the corner of the room as if he saw something 
there. Then he burst out again, in a tone of appealing 
anguish, — 

“ I can't bear it ... O God, it ’s too hard to lay upon 
me, — it 's too hard to think she ’s wicked.” 

Mr. Irwine had sat down again in silence. He was too 
wise to utter soothing words at present; and indeed the 
sight of Adam before him, with that look of sudden age 
which sometimes comes over a young face in moments of 
terrible emotion, — the hard bloodless look of the skin, the 
deep lines about the quivering mouth, the furrows in the 
brow, — the sight of this strong, firm man shattered by the 
invisible stroke of sorrow, moved him so deeply that speech 
was not easy. Adam stood motionless, with his eyes vacant- 
ly fixed in this way for a minute or two ; in that short space 
he was living through all his love again. 

“ She can’t ha’ done it,” he said, still without moving his 
eyes, as if he were only talking to himself ; “ it was fear 
made her hide it ... I forgive her for deceiving me . . . 
I forgive thee, Hetty . . . thee wast deceived too ... It ’s 
gone hard wi’ thee, my poor Hetty . . . but they ’ll never 
make me believe it.” 

He was silent again for a few moments, and then he said 
with fierce abruptness, — 

“ I ’ll go to him — I ’ll bring him back — I ’ll make him 
go and look at her in her misery — he shall look at her till 
he can’t forget it — it shall follow him night and day — as 
long as he lives it shall follow him — he sha’ n’t escape wi’ 
lies this time, — I ’ll fetch him, I ’ll drag him myself.” 

In the act of going towards the door, Adam paused auto- 
matically and looked about for his hat, quite unconscious 
where he was, or who was present with him. Mr. Irwine 
had followed him, and now took him by the arm, saying, in 
a quiet but decided tone, — 

“ No, Adam, no; I’m sure you will wish to stay and see 
what good can be done for her, instead of going on a use- 
less errand of vengeance. The punishment will surely fall 
without your aid. Besides, he is no longer in Ireland; he 
must be on his way home — or would be, long before you 
arrived ; for his grandfather, I know, wrote for him to come 


414 


THE BITTER WATERS SPREAD 


at least ten days ago. I want you now to go with me to 
Stoniton. I have ordered a horse for you to ride with us, 
as soon as you can compose yourself.” 

While Mr. Irwine was speaking Adam recovered his con- 
sciousness of the actual scene: he rubbed his hair off his 
forehead and listened. 

“ Remember,” Mr. Irwine went on, ‘‘ there are others to 
think of and act for, besides yourself, Adam : there are 
Hetty’s friends, the good Poysers, on whom this stroke will 
fall more heavily than I can bear to think. I expect it from 
your strength of mind, Adam, from your sense of duty to 
God and man, that you will try to act as long as action can 
be of any use.” 

In reality, Mr. Irwine proposed this journey to Stoniton 
for Adam’s own sake. Movement, with some object before 
him, was the best means of counteracting the violence of 
suffering in these first hours. 

“ You will go with me to Stoniton, Adam ? ” he said again, 
after a moment’s pause. “We have to see if it is really 
Hetty who is there, you know.” 

“ Yes, sir,” said Adam, “ I ’ll do what you think right. 
But the folks at th’ Hall Farm? ” 

“ I wish them not to know till I return to tell them my- 
self. I shall have ascertained things then which I am un- 
certain about now, and I shall return as soon as possible. 
Come now, the horses are ready.” 


CHAPTER XL. 

THE BITTER WATERS SPREAD. 

M r. irwine returned from Stoniton in a post-chaise 
that night ; and the first words Carroll said to him, as 
he entered the house, were, that Squire Donnithorne was 
dead, — found dead in his bed at ten o’clock that morn- 
ing, — and that Mrs. Irwine desired him to say she should 
be awake when Mr. Irwine came home, and she begged him 
not to go to bed without seeing her. 

“ Well, Dauphin,” Mrs. Irwine said, as her son entered 

415 


ADAM BEDE 


her room, you Ve come at last. So the old gentleman^s 
fidgetiness and low spirits, which made him send for Arthur 
in that sudden way, really meant something. I suppose Car- 
roll has told you that Donnithorne was found dead in his 
bed this morning. You will believe my prognostications 
another time, though I dare say I sha n’t live to prognosti- 
cate anything but my own death.” 

“ What have they done about Arthur ? ” said Mr. Irwine. 
“ Sent a messenger to await him at Liverpool ? ” 

“Yes; Ralph was gone before the news was brought to 
us. Dear Arthur, — I shall live now to see him master at 
the Chase, and making good times on the estate, like a gen- 
erous-hearted fellow as he is. He ’ll be as happy as a king 
now.” 

Mr. Irwine could not help giving a slight groan ; he was 
worn with anxiety and exertion, and his mother’s light words 
were almost intolerable. 

“What are you so dismal about. Dauphin? Is there any 
bad news? Or are you thinking of the danger for Arthur 
in crossing that frightful Irish Channel at this time of year ? ” 

“ No, mother, I ’m not thinking of that ; but I ’m not pre- 
pared to rejoice just now.” 

“ You ’ve been worried by this law business that you ’ve 
been to Stoniton about. What in the world is it, that you 
can’t tell me? ” 

“ You will know by and by, mother. It would not be 
right for me to tell you at present. Good-night ; you ’ll .sleep 
now you have no longer anything to listen for.” 

Mr. Irwine gave up his intention of sending a letter to 
meet Arthur, since it would not now hasten his return ; the 
news of his grandfather’s death would bring him as soon as 
he could possibly come. He could go to bed now and get 
some needful rest, before the time came for the morning’s 
heavy duty of carrying the sickening news to the Hall Farm 
and to Adam’s home. 

Adam himself was not come back from Stoniton; for 
though he shrank from seeing Hetty, he could not bear to 
go to a distance from her again. 

“ It ’s no use, sir,” he said to the Rector, — “ it ’s no use 
for me to go back. I can’t go to work again while she ’s 

416 


THE BITTER WATERS SPREAD 


here ; and I could n’t bear the sight o’ the things and folks 
round home. I ’ll take a bit of a room here, where I can see 
the prison walls ; and perhaps I shall get, in time, to bear see- 
ing her'^ 

Adam had not been shaken in his belief that Hetty was 
innocent of the crime she was charged with ; for Mr. Irwine, 
feeling that the belief in her guilt would be a crushing addi- 
tion to Adam’s load, had kept from him the facts which left 
no hope in his own mind. There was not any reason for 
thrusting the whole burthen on Adam at once; and Mr. Tr- 
wine, at parting, only said, — 

“ If the evidence should tell too strongly against her, 
Adam, we may still hope for a pardon. Her youth and other 
circumstances will be a plea for her.” 

“ Ah, and it ’s right people should know how she was 
tempted into the wrong way,” said Adam, with bitter ear- 
nestness. “ It ’s right they should know it was a fine gen- 
tleman made love to her, and turned her head wi’ notions. 
You ’ll remember, sir, you Ve promised to tell my mother 
and Seth, and the people at the Farm, who it was as led her 
wrong, else they ’ll think harder of her than she deserves. 
You ’ll be doing her a hurt by sparing him ; and I hold him 
the guiltiest before God, let her ha’ done what she may. If 
you spare him, I ’ll expose him ! ” 

I think your demand is just, Adam,” said Mr. Irwine; 
“ but when you are calmer, you will judge Arthur more mer- 
cifully. I say nothing now, only that his punishment is in 
other hands than ours.” 

Mr. Irwine felt it hard upon him that he should have to 
tell of Arthur’s sad part in the story of sin and sorrow, — he 
who cared for Arthur with fatherly affection, who had cared 
for him with fatherly pride. But he saw clearly that the 
secret must be known before long, even apait from Adam’s 
determination, since it was scarcely to be supposed that 
Hetty would persist to the end in her obstinate silence. He 
made up his mind to withhold nothing from the Poysers, 
but to tell them the worst at once, for there was no time to 
rob the tidings of their suddenness. Hetty’s trial must come 
on at the Lent assizes, and they were to be held at Stoniton 
the next week. It was scarcely to be hoped that Martin 

417 


27 


ADAM BEDE 


Poyser could escape the pain of being called as a witness, 
and it was better he should know everything as long before- 
hand as possible. 

Before ten o’clock on Thursday morning the home at the 
Hall Farm was a house of mourning for a misfortune felt to 
be worse than death. The sense of family dishonour was too 
keen even in the kind-hearted Martin Poyser the younger, to 
leave room for any compassion towards Hetty. He and his 
father were simple-minded farmers, proud of their untar- 
nished character, proud that they came of a family which had 
held up its head and paid its way as far back as its name was 
in the parish register; and Hetty had brought disgrace on 
them all, — disgrace that could never be wiped out. That 
was the all-conquering feeling in the mind both of father and 
son, — the scorching sense of disgrace, which neutralized all 
other sensibility; and Mr. Irwine was struck with surprise 
to observe that Mrs. Poyser was less severe than her hus- 
band. We are often startled by the severity of mild people 
on exceptional occasions ; the reason is that mild people are 
most liable to be under the yoke of traditional impressions. 

"‘I’m willing to pay any money as is wanted towards 
trying to bring her off,” said Martin the younger when Mr. 
Irwine was gone, while the old grandfather was crying in 
the opposite chair, “ but I ’ll not go nigh her, nor ever see 
her again, by my own will. She ’s made our bread bitter to 
us for all our lives to come, an’ we shall ne’er hold up our 
heads i’ this parish nor i’ any other. The parson talks o’ 
folks pitying us ; it ’s poor amends pity ’ull make us.” 

“ Pity ? ” said the grandfather, sharply. “ I ne’er wanted 
folks’s pity i’ my life afore . . . an’ I mun begin to be looked 
down on now, an’ me turned seventy-two last St. Thomas’s, 
an’ all th’ under-bearers and pall-bearers as I ’n picked for 
my funeral are i’ this parish and the next to ’t. . . . It’s o’ no 
use now ... I mun be ta’en to the grave by strangers.” 

“ Don’t fret so, father,” said Mrs. Poyser, who had spoken 
very little, being almost overawed by her husband’s unusual 
hardness and decision. “ You ’ll have your children wi’ you ; 
an’ there ’s the lads and the little un ’ull grow up in a new 
parish as well as i’ th’ old un.” 

“Ah, there ’s no staying i’ this country for us now,” said 

418 


THE BITTER WATERS SPREAD 


Mr. Poyser; and the hard tears trickled slowly down his 
round cheeks. “We thought it ’ud be bad luck if the old 
Squire gave us notice this Lady Day ; but I must gi’ notice 
myself now, an’ see if there can anybody be got to come an’ 
take to the crops as I ’n put i’ the ground ; for I wonna stay 
upo’ that man’s land a day longer nor I ’m forced to. An’ 
me, as thought him such a good, upright young man, as I 
should be glad when he come to be our landlord. I ’ll ne’er 
lift my hat to him again, nor sit i’ the same church wi’ him 
... a man as has brought shame on respectable folks . . . 
an’ pretended to be such a friend t’ everybody. . . . Poor 
Adam there ... a fine friend he ’s been t’ Adam, making 
speeches an’ talking so fine, an’ all the while poisoning the 
lad’s life, as it ’s much if he can stay i’ this country any more 
nor we can.” 

“ An’ you t’ ha’ to go into court, and own you ’re akin t’ 
her,” said the old man. “ Why, they ’ll cast it up to the lit- 
tle un as is n’t four ’ear old, some day, — they ’ll cast it up t’ 
her as she ’d a cousin tried at the ’sizes for murder.” 

“ It ’ll be their own wickedness, then,” said Mrs. Poyser, 
with a sob in her voice. “ But there ’s One above ’ull take 
care o’ the innicent child, else it ’s but little truth they tell us 
at church. It ’ll be harder nor ever to die an’ leave the little 
uns, an’ nobody to be a mother to ’em.” 

“ We ’d better ha’ sent for Dinah, if we’d known where she 
is,” said Mr. Poyser ; “ but Adam said she ’d left no direction 
where she ’d be at Leeds.” 

“ Why, she ’d be wi’ that woman as was a friend t’ her aunt 
Judith,” said Mrs. Poyser, comforted a little by this sugges- 
tion of her husband’s. “ I ’ve often heard Dinah talk of her, 
but I can’t remember what name she called her by. But 
there ’s Seth Bede ; he ’s like enough to know, for she ’s a 
preaching woman as the Methodists think a deal on.” 

“ I ’ll send to Seth,” said Mr. Poyser. “ I ’ll send Alick to 
tell him to come, or else to send us word o’ the woman’s 
name ; an’ thee canst write a letter ready to send off to Tred- 
dles’on as soon as we can make out a direction.” 

“ It ’s poor work writing letters when you want folks to 
come to you i’ trouble,” said Mrs. Poyser. “ Happen it ’ll be 
ever so long on the road, an’ never reach her at last.” 

419 


ADAM BEDE 


Before Alick arrived with the message, Lisbeth’s thoughts 
too had already flown to Dinah, and she had said to Seth, — 

‘‘ Eh, there ’s no comfort for us i’ this world any more, 
wi'out thee couldst get Dinah Morris to come to us, as she 
did when my old man died. Fd like her to come in an’ take 
me by th’ hand again, an’ talk to me ; she ’d tell me the rights 
on ’t belike, — she ’d happen to know some good i’ all this 
trouble an’ heart-break cornin’ upo’ that poor lad, as ne’er 
done a bit o’ wrong in ’s life, but war better nor anybody 
else’s son, pick the country round. Eh, my lad . . . Adam, 
my poor lad ! ” 

“ Thee wouldstna like me to leave thee to go and fetch 
Dinah ? ” said Seth, as his mother sobbed, and rocked her- 
self to and fro. 

“ Fetch her? ” said Lisbeth, looking up, and pausing from 
her grief, like a crying child who hears promise of consola- 
tion. Why, what place is ’t she ’s at, do they say ? ” 

“ It ’s a good way off, mother, — Leeds, a big town. But 
I could be back in three days, if thee couldst spare me.” 

Nay, nay, I canna spare thee. Thee must go an’ see thy 
brother, an’ bring me word what he ’s a-doin’. Mester Ir- 
wine said he ’d come an’ tell me, but I canna make out so well 
what it means when he tells me. Thee must go thysen, sin’ 
Adam wonna let me go to him. Write a letter to Dinah, 
canstna ? Thee ’t fond enough o’ writin’ when nobody wants 
thee.” 

I ’m not sure where she ’d be i’ that big town,” said 
Seth. “ If I ’d gone myself, I could ha’ found out by asking 
the members o’ the Society. But, perhaps, if I put Sarah 
Williamson, Methodist preacher, Leeds, o’ th’ outside, it 
might get to her ; for most like she ’d be wi’ Sarah William- 
son.” 

Alick came now with the message ; and Seth, finding that 
Mrs. Poyser was writing to Dinah, gave up the intention of 
writing himself ; but he went to the Hall Farm to tell them 
all that he could suggest about the address of the letter, and 
warn them that there might be some delay in the delivery, 
from his not knowing an exact direction. 

On leaving Lisbeth, Mr. Irwine had gone to Jonathan 
Burge, who had also a claim to be acquainted with what 

420 


THE BITTER WATERS SPREAD 


was likely to keep Adam away from business for some time ; 
and before six o’clock that evening there were few people in 
Broxton and Hayslope who had not heard the sad news. 
Mr. Irwine had not mentioned Arthur’s name to Burge ; and 
yet the story of his conduct towards Hetty, with all the 
dark shadows cast upon it by its terrible consequences, was 
presently as well known as that his grandfather was dead, 
and that he was come into the estate. For Martin Poser 
felt no motive to keep silence towards the one or two neigh- 
bours who ventured to come and shake him sorrowfully by 
the hand on the first day of his trouble ; and Carroll, who 
kept his ears open to all that passed at the Rectory, had 
framed an inferential version of the story, and found early 
opportunities of communicating it. 

One of those neighbours who came to Martin Poyser and 
shook him by the hand without speaking for some minutes 
was Bartle Massey. He had shut up his school, and was on 
his way to the Rectory, where he arrived about half-past 
seven in the evening, and, sending his duty to Mr. Irwine, 
begged pardon for troubling him at that hour, but had some- 
thing particular on his mind. He was shown into the study, 
where Mr. Irwine soon joined him. 

“Well, Bartle?” said Mr. Irwine, putting out his hand. 
That was not his usual way of saluting the schoolmaster, 
but trouble makes us treat all who feel with us very much 
alike. “ Sit down.” 

“ You know what I ’m come about as well as I do, sir, I 
dare say,” said Bartle. 

“ You wish to know the truth about the sad news that has 
reached you . . . about Hetty Sorrel ? ” 

“ Nay, sir, what I wish to know is about Adam Bede. I 
understand you left him at Stoniton, and I beg the favour 
of you to tell me what ’s the state of the poor lad’s mind, and 
what he means to do. For as for that bit o’ pink-and-white 
they ’ve taken the trouble to put in jail, I don’t value her a 
rotten nut, — not a rotten nut, — only for the harm or good 
that may come out of her to an honest man, — a lad I ’ve set 
such store by, — trusted to, that he ’d make my bit o’ knowl- 
edge go a good way in the world. . . . Why, sir, he ’s the 
only scholar I ’ve had in this stupid country that ever had 

421 


ADAM BEDE 


the will or the head-piece for mathematics. If he had n’t had 
so much hard work to do, poor fellow, he might have gone 
into the higher branches ; and then this might never have 
happened, — might never have happened.” 

Bartle was heated by the exertion of walking fast in an 
agitated frame of mind, and was not able to check himself 
on this first occasion of venting his feelings ; but he paused 
now to rub his moist forehead, and probably his moist eyes 
also. 

“ You ’ll excuse me, sir,” he said, when this pause had 
given him time to reflect, “ for running on in this way about 
my own feelings-, like that foolish dog of mine, howling in a 
storm, when there ’s nobody wants to listen to me. I came 
to hear you speak, not to talk myself ; if you ’ll take the trou- 
ble to tell me what the poor lad ’s doing.” 

Don’t put yourself under any restraint, Bartle,” said Mr. 
Irwine. The fact is, I ’m very much in the same condition 
as you just now : I ’ve a great deal that ’s painful on my 
mind, and I find it hard work to be quite silent about my 
own own feelings and only attend to others. I share your 
concern for Adam, though he is not the only one whose suf- 
ferings I care for in this affair. He intends to remain at 
Stoniton till after the trial ; it will come on probably a week 
to-morrow. He has taken a room there, and I encouraged 
him to do so, because I think it better he should be away 
from his own home at present ; and, poor fellow, he still be- 
lieves Hetty is innocent, — he wants to summon up courage 
* to see her if he can ; he is unwilling to leave the spot where 
she is.” 

Do you think the creatur ’s guilty, then ? ” said Bartle. 

Do you think they ’ll hang her? ” 

“ I ’m afraid it will go hard with her ; the evidence is very 
strong. And one bad symptom is that she denies every- 
thing, — denies that she has had a child in the face of the 
most positive evidence. I saw her myself, and she was ob- 
stinately silent to me ; she shrank up like a frightened animal 
when she saw me. I was never so shocked in my life as at the 
change in her. But I trust that in the worst case we may 
obtain a pardon, for the sake of the innocent who are in- 
volved.” 


422 


THE BITTER WATERS SPREAD 


“ Stuff and nonsense ! ” said Bartle, forgetting in his irrita- 
tion to whom he was speaking, — ‘‘I beg your pardon, sir, I 
mean it ’s stuff and nonsense for the innocent to care about 
her being hanged. For my own part, I think the sooner 
such women are put out o’ the world the better; and the 
men that help ’em to do the mischief had better go along 
with ’em, for that matter. What good will you do by keep- 
ing such vermin alive, eating the victual that ’ud feed ra- 
tional beings ? But if Adam ’s fool enough to care about it, 
I don’t want him to suffer more than ’s needful. ... Is he 
very much cut up, poor fellow ? ” Bartle added, taking out 
his spectacles and putting them on, as if they would assist 
his imagination. 

'' Yes, I ’m afraid the grief cuts very deep,” said Mr. Ir- 
wine. “ He looks terribly shattered ; and a certain violence 
came over him now and then yesterday, which made me wish 
I could have remained near him. But I shall go to Stoniton 
again to-morrow, and I have confidence enough in the 
strength of Adam’s principle to trust that he will be able to 
endure the worst, without being driven to anything rash.” 

Mr. Irwin e, who was involuntarily uttering his own 
thoughts rather than addressing Bartle Massey in the last 
sentence, had in his mind the possibility that the spirit of 
vengeance towards Arthur, which was the form Adam’s an- 
guish was continually taking, might make him seek an en- 
counter that was likely to end more fatally than the one in 
the Grove. This possibility heightened the anxiety with 
which he looked forward to Arthur’s arrival. But Bartle 
thought Mr. Irwine was referring to suicide, and his face 
v/ore a new alarm. 

I ’ll tell you what I have in my head, sir,” he said, and 
I hope you ’ll approve of it. I ’m going to shut up my 
school ; if the scholars come, they must go back again, that ’s 
all ; and I shall go to Stoniton, and look after Adam till this 
business is over. I ’ll pretend I ’m come to look on at the 
assizes ; he can’t object to that. What do you think about it, 
sir?” 

Well,” said Mr. Irwine, rather hesitatingly, there would 
be some real advantages in that . . . and I honour you for 
your friendship towards him, Bartle. But . . . you must 

423 


ADAM BEDE 


be careful what you say to him, you know. I ’m afraid you 
have too little fellow-feeling in what you consider his weak- 
ness about Hetty.” 

Trust to me, sir, — trust to me. I know what you mean. 
T Ve been a fool myself in my time, but that ’s between you 
and me. I sha’n’t thrust myself on him, — only keep my 
eye on him, and see that he gets some good food, and put in 
a word here and there.” 

“ Then,” said Mr. Irwine, reassured a little as to Bartle’s 
discretion, “ I think you ^11 be doing a good deed ; and it will 
be well for you to let Adam’s mother and brother know that 
you ’re going.” 

“ Yes, sir, yes,” said Bartle, rising and taking off his spec- 
tacles, “ I ’ll do that, I ’ll do that ; though the mother ’s a 
whimpering thing, — I don’t like to come within earshot of 
her ; however, she ’s a straight-backed, clean woman, none of 
your slatterns. I wish you good-by, sir, and thank you for 
the time you ’ve spared me. You ’re everybody’s friend in 
this business, — everybody’s friend. It ’s a heavy weight 
you ’ve got on your shoulders.” 

“ Good-by, Bartle, till we meet at Stoniton, as I dare say 
we shall.” 

Bartle hurried away from the Rectory, evading Carroll’s 
conversational advances, and saying in an exasperated tone 
to Vixen, whose short legs pattered beside him on the 
gravel, — 

'' Now, I shall be obliged to take you with me, you good- 
for-nothing woman! You ’d go fretting yourself to death if 
I left you, — you know you would, and perhaps get snapped 
up by some tramp ; and you ’ll be running into bad company, 
I expect, putting your nose in every hole and corner where 
you ’ve no business I But if you do anything disgraceful, I ’ll 
disowm you, — mind that, madam, mind that 1 ” 


424 


THE EVE OF THE TRIAL 


CHAPTER XLI. 


THE EVE OF THE TRIAL. 


N upper room in a dull Stoniton street, with two beds 



in it, — one laid on the floor. It is ten o’clock on 
Thursday night, and the dark wall opposite the window 
shuts out the moonlight that might have struggled with the 
light of the one dip candle by which Bartle Massey is pre- 
tending to read, while he is really looking over his specta- 
cles at Adam Bede, seated near the dark window. 

You would hardly have known it was Adam without be- 
ing told. His face has got thinner this last week; he has 
the sunken eyes, the neglected beard of a man just risen 
from a sick-bed. His heavy black hair hangs over his fore- 
head, and there is no active impulse in him which inclines 
him to push it off, that he may be more awake to what is 
around him. He has one arm over the back of the chair, 
and he seems to be looking down at his clasped hands. He 
is roused by a knock at the door. 

There he is,” said Bartle Massey, rising hastily and un- 
fastening the door. It was Mr. Irwine. 

Adam rose from his chair with instinctive respect, as Mr. 
Irwine approached him and took his hand. 

I ’m late, Adam,” he said, sitting down on the chair 
which Bartle placed for him ; '' but I was later in setting off 
from Broxton than I intended to be, and I have been in- 
cessantly occupied since I arrived. I have done everything 
now, however, — everything that can be done to-night, at 
least. Let us all sit down.” 

Adam took his chair again mechanically ; and Bartle, for 
whom there was no chair remaining, sat on the bed in the 
background. 

'‘Have you seen her, sir?” said Adam, tremulously. 

“ Yes, Adam ; I and the chaplain have both been with her 
this evening.” 

“ Did you ask her, sir . . . did you say anything about 
me? ” 

“Yes,” said Mr. Irwine, with some hesitation, “I spoke 


425 


ADAM BEDE 


of you. I said you wished to see her before the trial, if she 
consented/’ 

As Mr. Irwine paused, Adam looked at him with eager, 
questioning eyes. 

“ You know she shrinks from seeing any one, Adam. It 
is not only you, — some fatal influence seems to have shut 
up her heart against her fellow-creatures. She has scarcely 
said anything more than ‘ No,’ either to me or the chaplain. 
Three or four days ago, before you were mentioned to her, 
when I asked her if there was any one of her family whom 
she would like to see, — to whom she could open her mind, 
— she said, with a violent shudder, ' Tell them not to come 
near me, — I won’t see any of them.’ ” 

Adam’s head was hanging down again, and he did not 
speak. There was silence for a few minutes, and then Mr. 
Irwine said, — 

“ I don’t like to advise you against your own feelings, 
Adam, if they now urge you strongly to go and see her to- 
morrow morning, even without her consent. It is just pos- 
sible, notwithstanding appearances to the contrary, that the 
interview might affect her favourably. But I grieve to say I 
have scarcely any hope of that. She didn’t seem agitated 
when I mentioned your name; she only said "No,’ in the 
same cold, obstinate way as usual. And if the meeting had 
no good effect on her, it would be pure, useless suffering to 
you, — severe suffering, I fear. She is very much 
changed — ” 

Adam started up from his chair, and Seized his hat, which 
lay on the table. But he stood still then, and looked at Mr. 
Irwine, as if he had a question to ask which it was yet dif- 
ficult to utter. Bartle Massey rose quietly, turned the key 
in the door, and put it in his pocket. 

“ Is he come back? ” said Adam, at last. 

"" No, he has not,” said Mr. Irwine, quietly. Lay down 
your hat, Adam, unless you like to walk out with me for a 
little fresh air. I fear you have not been out again to-day.” 

"" You need n’t deceive me, sir,” said Adam, looking hard 
at Mr. Irwine, and speaking in a tone of angry suspicion. 

You need n’t be afraid of me. I only want justice. I want 
him to feel what she feels. It ’s his work . . . she was a 

426 


THE EVE OF THE TRIAL 


child as, it ’ud ha' gone t’ anybody’s heart to look at. ... I 
don’t care what she ’s done ... it was him brought her to 
it. And he shall know it ... he shall feel it ... if there ’s 
a just God, he shall feel what it is t’ ha’ brought a child like 
her to sin and misery.” 

I ’m not deceiving you, Adam,” said Mr. Irwine. “ Ar- 
thur Donnithorne is not come back, — was not come back 
when I left. I have left a letter for him ; he will know all as 
soon as he arrives.” 

But you don’t mind about it,” said Adam, indignantly. 
“ You think it does n’t matter as she lies there in shame and 
misery, and he knows nothing about it, — he suffers noth- 
ing.” 

“ Adam, he will know, — he will suffer, long and bitterly. 
He has a heart and a conscience: I can’t be entirely de- 
ceived in his character. I am convinced — I am sure he 
did n’t fall under temptation without a struggle. He may 
be weak, but he is not callous, not coldly selfish. I am per- 
suaded that this will be a shock of which he will feel the 
effects all his life. Why do you crave vengeance in this 
way? No amount of torture that you could inflict on him 
could benefit her:' 

“ No — O God, no,” Adam groaned out, sinking on his 
chair again : but then, that ’s the deepest curse of all . . . 
that ’s what makes the blackness of it . . . it can never be 
undone. My poor Hetty . . . she can never be my sweet 
Hetty again . . . the prettiest thing God had made — smil- 
ing up at me ... I thought she loved me . . . and was 
good — ” 

Adam’s voice had been gradually sinking into a hoarse 
undertone, as if he were only talking to himself ; but now he 
said abruptly, looking at Mr. Irwine, — 

‘‘But she isn’t as guilty as they say? You don’t think 
she is, sir? She can’t ha’ done it.” 

“ That perhaps can never be known with certainty, 
Adam,” Mr. Irwine answered gently. “ In these cases we 
sometimes form our judgment on what seems to us strong 
evidence, and yet, for want of knowing some small fact, our 
judgment is wrong. But suppose the worst : you have no 
right to say that the guilt of her crime lies with him, and 

427 


ADAM BEDE 


that he ought to bear the punishment. It is not for us men 
to apportion the shares of moral guilt and retribution. We 
find it impossible to avoid mistakes even in determining who 
has committed a single criminal act, and the problem how 
far a man is to be held responsible for the unforeseen con- 
sequences of his own deed is one that might well make us 
tremble to look into it. The evil consequences that may lie 
folded in a single act of selfish indulgence in a thought so 
awful that it surely ought to awaken some feeling less pre- 
sumptuous than a rash desire to punish. You have a mind 
that can understand this fully, Adam, when you are calm. 
Don’t suppose I can’t enter into the anguish that drives you 
into this state of revengeful hatred ; but think of this : if you 
were to obey your passion, — for it is passion, and you de- 
ceive yourself in calling it justice, — it might be with you 
precisely as it has been with Arthur; nay, worse, your pas- 
sion might lead you yourself into a horrible crime.” 

“ No, — not worse,” said Adam, bitterly ; I don’t be- 
lieve it ’s worse. I ’d sooner do it, — I ’d sooner do a wick- 
edness as I could suffer for by myself, than ha’ brought her 
to do wickedness and then stand by and see ’em punish her 
while they let me alone ; and all for a bit o’ pleasure, as, if he 'd 
had a man’s heart in him, he ’d ha’ cut his hand off sooner 
than he’d ha’ taken it. What if he didn’t foresee what ’s hap- 
pened ? He foresaw enough ; he ’d no right to expect any- 
thing but harm and shame to her. And then he wanted to 
smooth it off wi’ lies. No, — there ’s plenty o’ things folks 
are hanged for, not half so hateful as that: let a man do 
what he will, if he knows he ’s to bear the punishment him- 
self, he is n’t half so bad as a mean, selfish coward as makes 
things easy t’ himself, and knows all the while the punish- 
ment ’ll fall on somebody else.” 

“ There again you partly deceive yourself, Adam. There 
is no sort of wrong deed of which a man can bear the pun- 
ishment alone; you can’t isolate yourself, and say that the 
evil which is in you shall not spread. Men’s lives are as 
thoroughly blended with each other as the air they breathe ; 
evil spreads as necessarily as disease. I know, I feel the 
terrible extent of suffering this sin of Arthur’s has caused 
to others; but so does every sin cause suffering to others 

428 


THE EVE OF THE TRIAL 


besides those who commit it. An act of vengeance on yoi 
part against Arthur would simply be another evil added to 
those we are suffering under : you could not bear the pun- 
ishment alone ; you would entail the worst sorrows on every 
one who loves you. You would have committed an act of 
blind fury, that would leave all the present evils just as they 
were, and add worse evils to them. You may tell me that 
you meditate no fatal act of vengeance; but the feeling in 
your mind is what gives birth to such actions, and as long 
as you indulge it, as long as you do not see that to fix your 
mind on Arthur’s punishment is revenge, and not justice, 
you are in danger of being led on to the commission of some 
great wrong. Remember what you told me about your feel- 
ings after you had given that blow to Arthur in the Grove.” 

Adam was silent : the last words had called up a vivid 
image of the past, and Mr. Irwine left him to his thoughts, 
while he spoke to Bartle Massey about old Mr. Donni- 
thorne’s funeral and other matters of an indifferent kind. 
But at length Adam turned round and said, in a more sub- 
dued tone, — 

“ I Ve not asked about ’em at th’ Hall Farm, sir. Is Mr. 
Poyser coming? ” 

“ He is come ; he is in Stoniton to-night. But I could 
not advise him to see you, Adam. His own mind is in a 
very perturbed state, and it is best he should not see you till 
you are calmer.” 

‘‘ Is Dinah Morris come to ’em, sir ? Seth said they ’d 
sent for her.” 

“ No. Mr. Poyser tells me she was not come when he left. 
They ’re afraid the letter has not reached her. It seems they 
had no exact address.” 

Adam sat ruminating a little while, and then said, — 

“ I wonder if Dinah ’ud ha’ gone to see her. But perhaps 
the Poysers would ha’ been sorely against it, since they won’t 
come nigh her themselves. But I think she would, for the 
Methodists are great folks for going into the prisons; and 
Seth said he thought she would. She ’d a very tender way 
with her, Dinah had; I wonder if she could ha’ done any 
good. You never saw her, sir, did you? ” 

Yes, I did ; I had a conversation with her, — she pleased 

429 


ADAM BEDE 

ne a good deal. And now you mention it, I wish she would 
come; for it is possible that a gentle, mild woman like her 
might move Hetty to open her heart. The jail chaplain is 
rather harsh in his manner.” 

But it ’s o’ no use if she does n’t come,” said Adam, 
sadly. 

“ If I ’d thought of it earlier, I would have taken some 
measures for finding her out,” said Mr. Irwine ; but it ’s 
too late now, I fear. . . . Well, Adam, I must go now. Try 
to get some rest to-night. God bless you. I ’ll see you early 
to-morrow morning.” 


CHAPTER XLII. 

THE MORNING OF THE TRIAL. 

A t one o’clock the next day Adam was alone in his dull 
upper room ; his watch lay before him on the table, as 
if he were counting the long minutes. He had no knowledge 
of what was likely to be said by the witnesses on the trial, 
for he had shrunk from all the particulars connected with 
Hetty’s arrest and accusation. This brave, active man, who 
would have hastened towards any danger or toil to rescue 
Hetty from an apprehended wrong or misfortune, felt him- 
self powerless to contemplate irremediable evil and suffer- 
ing. The susceptibility which would have been an impelling 
force where there was any possibility of action, became help- 
less anguish when he was obliged to be passive, or else 
sought an active outlet in the thought of inflicting justice on 
Arthur. Energetic natures, strong for all strenuous deeds, 
will often rush away from a hopeless sufferer, as if they were 
hard-hearted. It is the overmastering sense of pain that 
drives them. They shrink by an ungovernable instinct, as 
they would shrink from laceration. Adam had brought him- 
self to think of seeing Hetty, if she would consent to see him, 
because he thought the meeting might possibly be a good 
to her, — might help to melt away the terrible hardness they 
told him of. If she saw he bore her no ill-will for what she 
had done to him, she might open her heart to him. But this 


430 


THE MORNING OF THE TRIAL 


resolution had been an immense effort; he trembled at the 
thought of seeing her changed face, as a timid woman trem- 
bles at the thought of the surgeon's knife ; and he chose now 
to bear the long hours of suspense, rather than encounter 
what seemed to him the more intolerable agony of witness- 
ing her trial. 

Deep, unspeakable suffering may well be called a baptism, 
a regeneration, the initiation into a new state. The yearning 
memories, the bitter regret, the agonized sympathy, the 
struggling appeals to the Invisible Right, — all the intense 
emotions which had filled the days and nights of the past 
week, and were compressing themselves again like an eager 
crowd into the hours of this single morning, made Adam 
look back on all the previous years as if they had been a dim, 
sleepy existence, and he had only now awaked to full con- 
sciousness. It seemed to him as if he had always before 
thought it a light thing that men should suffer ; as if all that 
he had himself endured and called sorrow before, was only a 
moment’s stroke that had never left a bruise. Doubtless a 
great anguish may do the work of years, and we may come 
out from that baptism of fire with a soul full of new awe and 
new pity. 

“ Oh, God,” Adam groaned, as he leaned on the table, and 
looked blankly at the face of the watch, and men have suf- 
fered like this before . . . and poor helpless young things 
have suffered like her. . . . Such a little while ago looking 
so happy and so pretty . . . kissing ’em all, her grandfather 
and all of ’em, and they wishing her luck. . . . O my poor, 
poor Hetty . . . dost think on it now ? ” 

Adam started and looked round towards the door. Vixen 
had begun to whimper, and there was a sound of a stick and 
a lame walk on the stairs. It was Bartle Massey come back. 
Could it be all over ? 

Bartle entered quietly, and going up to Adam, grasped his 
hand and said, “ I ’m just come to look at you, my boy, for 
the folks are gone out of court for a bit.” 

Adam’s heart beat so violently he was unable to speak, — 
he could only return the pressure of his friend’s hand; and 
Bartle, drawing up the other chair, came and sat in front of 
him, taking off his hat and his spectacles. 

431 


ADAM BEDE 


'' That 's a thing never happened to me before/’ he’ ob- 
served, — “ to go out o’ doors with my spectacles on. I 
clean forgot to take ’em off.” 

The old man made this trivial remark, thinking it better 
not to respond at all to Adam’s agitation : he would gather, 
in an indirect way, that there was nothing decisive to com- 
municate at present. 

“And now,” he said, rising again, “I must see to your hav- 
ing a bit of the loaf, and some of that wine Mr. Irwine sent 
this morning. He ’ll be angry with me if you don’t have it. 
Come, now,” he went on, bringing forward the bottle and 
the loaf, and pouring some wine into a cup, “ I must have a 
bit and a sup myself. Drink a drop with me, my lad, — 
drink with me.” 

Adam pushed the cup gently away, and said entreatingly, 
“ Tell me about it, Mr. Massey, — tell me all about it. Was 
she there ? Have they begun ? ” 

“ Yes, my boy, yes, — 'it ’s taken all the time since I first 
went ; but they ’re slow, — they ’re slow ; and there ’s the 
counsel they ’ve got for her puts a spoke in the wheel when- 
ever he can, and makes a deal to do with cross-examining 
the witnesses, and quarrelling with the other lawyers. 
That ’s all he can do for the money they give him ; and it ’s 
a big sum, — it ’s a big sum. But he ’s a ’cute fellow, with 
an eye that ’ud pick the needles out of the hay in no time. 
If a man had got no feelings, it ’ud be as good as a demon- 
stration to listen to what goes on in court; but a tender 
heart makes one stupid. I ’d have given up figures forever 
only to have had some good news to bring to you, my poor 
lad.” 

“ But does it seem to be going against her? ” said Adam. 
“ Tell me what they ’ve said. I must know it now, — I must 
know what they have to bring against her.” 

“ Why, the chief evidence yet has been the doctors ; all but 
Martin Poyser, — poor Martin. Everybody in court felt for 
him, — it was like one sob, the sound they made when he 
came down again. The worst was, when they told him to 
look at the prisoner at the bar. It was hard work, poor fel- 
low, — it was hard work. Adam, my boy, the blow falls 
heavily on him as well as you : you must help poor Martin ; 

432 


THE MORNING OF THE TRIAL 


you must show courage. Drink some wine now, and show 
me you mean to bear it like a man.” 

Bartle had made the right sort of appeal. Adam, with an 
air of quiet obedience, took up the cup, and drank a little. 

“ Tell me how she looked,” he said presently. 

“ Frightened, very frightened, when they first brought her 
in ; it was the first sight of the crowd and the judge, poor 
creatur. And there ’s a lot o’ foolish women in fine clothes, 
with gewgaws all up their arms, and feathers on their heads, 
sitting near the judge; they’ve dressed themselves out in 
that way, one ’ud think, to be scarecrows and warnings 
against any man ever meddling with a woman again; they 
put up their glasses, and stared and whispered. But after 
that she stood like a white image, staring down at her hands, 
and seeming neither to hear nor see anything, And she ’s 
as white as a sheet. She didn’t speak when they asked her 
if she’d plead ‘ guilty ’ or ' not guilty,’ and they plead ^ not 
guilty ’ for her. But when she heard her uncle’s name, there 
seemed to go a shiver right through her; and when they 
told him to look at her, she hung her head down, and cow- 
ered, and hid her face in her hands. He ’d much ado to 
speak, poor man, his voice trembled so. And the counsel- 
lors, — who look as hard as nails mostly, — I saw, spared 
him as much as they could. Mr. Irwine put himself near 
him, and went with him out o’ court. Ah, it ’s a great thing 
in a man’s life to be able to stand by a neighbour and uphold 
him in such trouble as that.” 

God bless him, and you too, Mr. Massey,” said Adam, in 
a low voice, laying his hand on Bartle’s arm. 

Ay, ay, he ’s good metal ; he gives the right ring when 
you try him, our parson does. A man o’ sense, — says no 
more than ’s needful. He ’s not one of those that think they 
can comfort you with chattering, as if folks who stand by 
and look on knew a deal better what the trouble was 
than those who have to bear it. I ’ve had to do with such 
folks in my time, — in the south, when I was in trouble my- 
self. Mr. Irwine is to be a witness himself, by and by, on 
her side, you know, to speak to her character and bringing 
up.” 

“But the other evidence . . . does it go hard against 


28 


433 


ADAM BEDE 


her? ” said Adam. “ What do you think, Mr. Massey? Tell 
me the truth. 

“ Yes, my lad, yes; the truth is the best thing to tell. It 
must come at last. The doctor’s evidence is heavy on her, — 
is heavy. But she ’s gone on denying she ’s had a child from 
first to last : these poor silly women-things, — they ’ve not 
the sense to know it ’s no use denying what ’s proved. It ’ll 
make against her with the jury, I doubt, her being so obsti- 
nate ; they may be less for recommending her to mercy, if the 
verdict ’s against her. But Mr. Irwine ’ull leave no stone 
unturned with the judge, — you may rely upon that, Adam.” 

“ Is there nobody to stand by her, and seem to care for her 
in the court ? ” said Adam. 

There ’s the chaplain o’ the jail sits near her, but he ’s a 
sharp, ferrety-faced man, — another sort o’ flesh and blood 
to Mr. Irwine. They say the jail chaplains are mostly the 
fag-end o’ the clergy.” 

“ There ’s one man as ought to be there,” said Adam, bit- 
terly. Presently he drew himself up, and looked fixedly out 
of the window, apparently turning over some new idea in his 
mind. 

“ Mr. Massey,” he said at last, pushing the hair of¥ his 
forehead, “ I ’ll go back with you. I ’ll go into court. It ’s 
cowardly of me to keep away. I ’ll stand by her, — I ’ll own 
her, — for all she ’s been deceitful. They ought n’t to cast 
her off, — her own flesh and blood. We hand folks over to 
God’s mercy, and show none ourselves. I used to be hard 
sometimes ; I ’ll never be hard again. I ’ll go, Mr. Massey, 
— I ’ll go with you.” 

There was a decision in Adam’s manner which would have 
prevented Bartle from opposing him, even if he had wished 
to do so. He only said, — 

Take a bit, then, and another sup, Adam, for the love 
of me. See, I must stop and eat a morsel. Now, you take 
some.” 

Nerved by an active resolution, Adam took a morsel of 
bread, and drank some wine. He was haggard and un- 
shaven, as he had been yesterday; but he stood upright 
again, and looked more like the Adam Bede of former days. 


434 


THE VERDICT 


CHAPTER XLIIL 

THE VERDICT. 

T he place fitted up that day as a court of justice was a 
grand old hall, now destroyed by fire. The mid-day 
light that fell on the close pavement of human heads was shed 
through a line of high pointed windows, variegated with the 
mellow tints of old painted glass. Grim dusty armour hung 
in high relief in front of the dark oaken gallery at the far- 
ther end ; and under the broad arch of the great mullioned 
window opposite was spread a curtain of old tapestry, cov- 
ered with dim melancholy figures, like a dozing indistinct 
dream of the past. It was a place that through the rest of 
the year was haunted with the shadowy memories of old 
kings and queens, unhappy, discrowned, imprisoned ; but 
to-day all those shadows had fled, and not a soul in the vast 
hall felt the presence of any but a living sorrow, which was 
quivering in warm hearts. 

But that sorrow seemed to have made itself feebly felt 
hitherto, now when Adam Bede’s tall figure was suddenly 
seen, being ushered to the side of the prisoner’s dock. In 
the broad sunlight of the great hall, among the sleek shaven 
faces of other men, the marks of suffering in his face were 
startling even to Mr. Irwine, who had last seen him in the 
dim light of his small room ; and the neighbours from Hay- 
slope who were present, and who told Hetty Sorrel’s story by 
their firesides in their old age, never forgot to say how it 
moved them when Adam Bede, poor fellow, taller by the 
head than most of the people round him, carne into court, 
and took his place by her side. 

But that sorrow seemed to have made itself feebly felt 
position Bartle Massey had described, her hands crossed over 
each other, and her eyes fixed on them. Adam had not 
dared to look at her in the first moments ; but at last, when 
the attention of the court was withdrawn by the proceedings, 
he turned his face towards her with a resolution not to 
shrink. 

Why did they say she was so changed? In the corpse 
we love, it is the likeness we see, — it is the likeness, which 

435 


ADAM BEDE 


makes itself felt the more keenly because something else was 
and is not. There they were, — the sweet face and neck, 
with the dark tendrils of hair, the long dark lashes, the 
rounded cheek, and the pouting lips ; pale and thin, — yes, 
but like ITetty, and only Hetty. Others thought she looked 
as if some demon had cast a blighting glance upon her, 
withered up the woman’s soul in her, and left only a hard, 
despairing obstinacy. But the mother’s yearning, that com- 
pletest type of the life in another life which is the essence of 
real human love, feels the presence of the cherished child 
even in the debased, degraded man ; and to Adam this pale, 
hard-looking culprit was the Hetty who had smiled at him 
in the garden under the apple-tree boughs, — she was that 
Hetty’s corpse, which he had trembled to look at the first 
time, and then was unwilling to turn away his eyes from. 

But presently he heard something that compelled him to 
listen, and made the sense of sight less absorbing. A woman 
was in the witness-box, — a middle-aged woman, who spoke 
in a firm, distinct voice. She said : — 

My name is Sarah Stone. I am a widow, and keep a 
small shop licensed to sell tobacco, snuff, and tea, in Church 
Lane, Stoniton. The prisoner at the bar is the same young 
woman who came, looking ill and tired, with a basket on 
her arm, and asked for a lodging at my house on Saturday 
evening, the 27th of February. She had taken the house for 
a public, because there was a figure against the door. And 
when I said I did n’t take in lodgers, the prisoner began to 
cry, and said she was too tired to go anywhere else, and she 
only wanted a bed for one night. And her prettiness, and 
her condition, and something respectable about her clothes 
and looks, and the trouble she seemed to be in, made me as I 
could n’t find in my heart to send her away at once. I asked 
her to sit down, and gave her some tea, and asked her where 
she was going, and where her friends were. She said she 
was going home to her friends ; they were farming folks a 
good way off, and she ’d had a long journey that had cost 
her more money than she expected, so as she ’d hardly any 
money left in her pocket, and was afraid of going where it 
would cost her much. She had been obliged to sell most of 
the things out of her basket ; but she ’d thankfully give a 

436 


THE VERDICT 


shilling for a bed. I saw no reason why I should n’t take 
the young woman in for the night. I had only one room, 
but there were two beds in it, and I told her she might stay 
with me. I thought she ’d been led wrong, and got into 
trouble ; but if she was going to her friends, it would be a 
good work to keep her out of further harm.” 

The witness then stated that in the night a child was born, 
and she identified the baby-clothes then shown to her as 
those in which she had herself dressed the child. 

‘‘ Those are the clothes. I made them myself, and had 
kept them by me ever since my last child was born. I took 
a deal of trouble both for the child and the mother. I 
could n’t help taking to the little thing and being anxious 
about it. I did n’t send for a doctor, for there seemed no 
need. I told the mother in the daytime she must tell me 
the name of her friends, and where they lived, and let me 
write to them. She said, by and by she would write her- 
self, but not to-day. She would have no nay, but she would 
get up and be dressed, in spite of everything I could say. 
She said she felt quite strong enough ; and it was wonderful 
what spirit she showed. But I was n’t quite easy what I 
should do about her, and towards evening I made up my 
mind 1 ’d go, after Meeting was over, and speak to our 
minister about it. I left the house about half-past eight 
o’clock. I did n’t go out at the shop door, but at the back 
door, which opens into a narrow alley. I ’ve only got the 
ground-floor of the house, and the kitchen and bedroom both 
look into the alley. I left the prisoner sitting up by the fire 
in the kitchen with the baby on her lap. She had n’t cried or 
seemed low at all, as she did the night before. I thought she 
had a strange look with her eyes, and she got a bit flushed 
towards evening. I was afraid of the fever, and I thought 
I ’d call and ask an acquaintance of mine, an experienced 
woman, to come back with me when I went out. It was a 
very dark night. I did n’t fasten the door behind me ; there 
was no lock : it was a latch with a bolt inside, and when there 
was nobody in the house I always went out at the shop door. 
But I thought there was no danger in leaving it unfastened 
that little while. I was longer than I meant to be, for I had 
to wait for the woman that came back with me. It was an 

437 


ADAM BEDE 


hour and a half before we got back ; and when we went in, 
the candle was standing burning just as I left it, but the 
prisoner and the baby were both gone. She ’d taken her 
cloak and bonnet, but she ’d left the basket and the things in 
it. ... I was dreadful frightened, and angry with her for 
going. 1 did n't go to give information, because I ’d no 
thought she meant to do any harm, and I knew she had 
money in her pocket to buy her food and lodging. I did n’t 
like to set the constable after her, for she ’d a right to go 
from me if she liked.” 

The effect of this evidence on Adam was electrical ; it gave 
him new force. Hetty could not be guilty of the crime, — 
her heart must have clung to her baby, else why should she 
have taken it with her ? She might have left it behind. The 
little creature had died naturally, and then she had hidden it ; 
babies were so liable to death, and there might be the strong- 
est suspicions without any proof of guilt. His mind was so 
occupied with imaginary arguments against such suspicions 
that he could not listen to the cross-examination by Hetty’s 
counsel, who tried, without result, to elicit evidence that the 
prisoner had shown some movements of maternal affection 
towards the child. The whole time this witness was being 
examined, Hetty had stood as motionless as before ; no word 
seemed to arrest her ear. But the sound of the next wit- 
ness’s voice touched a chord that was still sensitive; she 
gave a start and a frightened look towards him, but imme- 
diately turned away her head and looked down at her hands 
as before. This witness was a man, a rough peasant. He 
said : — 

“ My name is John Olding. I am a labourer, and live at 
Tedd’s Hole, two miles out of Stoniton. A week last Mon- 
day, towards one o’clock in the afternoon, I was going to- 
wards Hetton Coppice ; and about a quarter of a mile from 
the coppice I saw the prisoner, in a red cloak, sitting under 
a bit of a haystack not far off the stile. She got up when 
she saw me, and seemed as if she ’d be walking on the other 
way. It was a regular road through the fields, and nothing 
very uncommon to see a young woman there; but I took 
notice of her because she looked white and scared. I should 
have thought she was a beggar-woman only for her good 

438 


THE VERDICT 


clothes. I thought she looked a bit crazy, but it was no 
business of mine. I stood and looked back after her, but 
she went right on while she was in sight. I had to go to 
the other side of the coppice to look after some stakes. 
There ’s a road right through it, and bits of openings here 
and there, where the trees have been cut down, and some of 
’em not carried away. I did n’t go straight along the road, 
but turned off towards the middle, and took a shorter way 
towards the spot I wanted to get to. I had n’t got far out 
of the road into one of the open places, before I heard a 
strange cry. I thought it did n’t come from any animal I 
knew, but I was n’t for stopping to look about just then. 
But it went on, and seemed so strange to me in that place, 
I could n’t help stopping to look. I began to think I might 
make some money of it, if it was a new thing. But I had 
hard work to tell which way it came from, and for a good 
while I kept looking up at the boughs. And then I thought 
it came from the ground; and there was a lot of timber- 
choppings lying about, and loose pieces of turf, and a trunk 
or two. And I looked about among them, but could find 
nothing; and at last the cry stopped. So I was for giving 
it up, and I went on about my business. But when I came 
back the same way pretty nigh an hour after, I could n’t help 
laying down my stakes to have another look. And just as I 
was stooping and laying down the stakes, I saw something 
odd and round and whitish lying on the ground under a nut- 
bush by the side of me. And I stooped down on hands and 
knees to pick it up. And I saw it was a little baby’s hand.” 

At these words a thrill ran through the court. Hetty was 
visibly trembling; now, for the first time, she seemed to be 
listening to what a witness said. 

“ There was a lot of timber-choppings put together just 
where the ground went hollow, like, under the bush, and the 
hand came out from among them. But there was a hole left 
in one place, and I could see down it, and see the child’s 
head ; and I made haste and did away the turf and the chop- 
pings, and took out the child. It had got comfortable 
clothes on, but its body was cold, and I thought it must be 
dead. I made haste back with it out of the wood, and took 
it home to my v/ife. She said it was dead, and I ’d better take 

439 


ADAM BEDE 


it to the parish and tell the constable. And I said, ' I ’ll lay 
my life it ’s that young woman’s child as I met going to the 
coppice.’ But she seemed to be gone clean out of 
sight. And I took the child on to Hetton parish and told 
the constable, and we went on to Justice Hardy. And then 
we went looking after the young woman till dark at night, 
and we went and gave information at Stoniton, as they might 
stop her. And the next morning, another constable came to 
me, to go with him to the spot where I found the child. And 
when we got there, there was the prisoner a-sitting against 
the bush where I found the child ; and she cried out when 
she saw us, but she never offered to move. She ’d got a big 
piece of bread on her lap.” 

Adam had given a faint groan of despair while this wit- 
ness was speaking. He had hidden his face on his arm, 
which rested on the boarding in front of him. It 
was the supreme moment of his suffering : Hetty was guilty ; 
and he was silently calling to God for help. He heard no 
more of the evidence, and was unconscious when the case 
for the prosecution had closed, — unconscious that Mr. Ir- 
wine was in the witness-box, telling of Hetty’s unblemished 
character in her own parish, and of the virtuous habits in 
which she had been brought up. This testimony could have 
no influence on the verdict, but it was given as part of that 
plea for mercy which her own counsel would have made if 
he had been allowed to speak for her, — a favour not granted 
to criminals in those stern times. 

At last Adam lifted up his head, for there was a general 
movement round him. The judge had addressed the jury, 
and they were retiring. The decisive moment was not far 
off. Adam felt a shuddering horror that would not let him 
look at Hetty ; but she had long relapsed into her blank hard 
indifference. All eyes were strained to look at her, but she 
stood like a statue of dull despair. 

There was a mingled rustling, whispering and low buz- 
zing throughout the court during this interval. The desire 
to listen was suspended, and every one had some feeling or 
opinion to express in undertones. Adam sat looking blankly 
before him, but he did not see the objects that were right in 

440 


THE VERDICT 


front of his eyes, — the counsel and attorneys talking wu, 
an air of cool business, and Mr. Irwine in low earnest con- 
versation with the judge ; did not see Mr. Irwine sit down 
again in agitation, and shake his head mournfully when 
somebody whispered to him. The inward action was too 
intense for Adam to take in outward objects until some 
strong sensation roused him. 

It was not very long, hardly more than a quarter of an 
hour, before the knock which told that the jury had come 
to their decision fell as a signal for silence on every ear. 
It is sublime, — that sudden pause of a great multitude, 
which tells that one soul moves in them all. Deeper and 
deeper the silence seemed to become, like the deepening 
night, while the jurymen's names were called over, and the 
prisoner was made to hold up her hand, and the jury were 
asked for their verdict. 

Guilty.” 

It was the verdict every one expected; but there was a 
sigh of disappointment from some hearts, that it was fol- 
lowed by no recommendation to mercy. Still the sympathy 
of the court was not with the prisoner : the unnaturalness of 
her crime stood out the more harshly by the side of her hard 
immovability and obstinate silence. Even the verdict, to 
distant eyes, had not appeared to move her ; but those who 
were near saw her trembling. 

The stillness was less intense until the judge put on his 
black cap, and the chaplain in his canonicals was observed 
behind him. Then it deepened again, before the crier had 
had time to command silence. If any sound were heard, it 
must have been the sound of beating hearts. The judge 
spoke, — 

Hester Sorrel, — ” 

The blood rushed to Hetty's face, and then fled back 
again, as she looked up at the judge, and kept her wide-open 
eyes fixed on him, as if fascinated by fear. Adam had not 
yet turned towards her; there was a deep horror, like a 
great gulf, between them. But at the words, “ and then 
to be hanged by the neck till you be dead,” a piercing shriek 
rang through the hall. It was Hetty's shriek. Adam started 


441 


ADAM BEDE 


. his feet and stretched out his arms towards her ; but the 
arms could not reach her : she had fallen down in a fainting- 
fit, and was carried out of court. 


CHAPTER XLIV. 

Arthur’s return. 

W HEN Arthur Donnithorne landed at Liverpool, and 
read the letter from his aunt Lydia, briefly an- 
nouncing his grandfather’s death, his first feeling was : 
“ Poor grandfather ! I wish I could have got to him to be 
with him when he died. He might have felt or wished some- 
thing at the last that I shall never know now. It was a 
lonely death.” 

It is impossible to say that his grief was deeper than that. 
Pity and softened memory took place of the old antagon- 
ism ; and in his busy thoughts about the future, as the chaise 
carried him rapidly along towards the home where he was 
now to be master, there was a continually recurring effort 
to remember anything by which he could show a regard for 
his grandfather’s wishes, without counteracting his own 
cherished aims for the good of the tenants and the estate. 
But it is not in human nature — only in human pretence — 
for a young man like Arthurj with a fine constitution and 
fine spirits, thinking well of himself, believing that others 
think well of him, and having a very ardent intention to give 
them more and more reason for that good opinion, — it 
is not possible for such a young man, just coming into a 
splendid estate through the death of a very old man whom 
he w’as not fond of, to feel anything very different from ex- 
ultant joy. Now his real life was beginning; now he would 
have room and opportunity for action, and he would use 
them. He would show the Loamshire people what a fine 
country gentleman was ; he would not exchange that career 
for any other under the sun. He felt himself riding over the 
hills in the breezy autumn days, looking after favourite plans 
of drainage and enclosure; then admired on sombre morn- 
ings as the best rider on the best horse in the hunt ; spoken 


442 


ARTHUR’S RETURN 


well of on market-days as a first-rate landlord; by and by 
making speeches at election dinners, and showing a wonder- 
ful knowledge of agriculture; the patron of new ploughs 
and drills, the severe upbraider of negligent landowners, 
and witlial a jolly fellow that everybody must like, — happy 
faces greeting him everywhere on his own estate, and the 
neighbouring families on the best terms with him. The 
Irwines should dine with him every week, and have their 
own carriage to come in ; for in some very delicate way 
that Arthur would devise, the lay-impropriator of the Hay- 
slope tithes would insist on paying a couple of hundreds 
more to the Vicar; and his aunt should be as comfortable 
as possible, and go on living at the Chase, if she liked, in 
spite of her old-maidish ways, — at least until he was mar- 
ried : and that event lay in the indistinct background, for 
Arthur had not yet seen the woman who would play the 
lady-wife to the first-rate country gentleman. 

These were Arthur’s chief thoughts, so far as a man’s 
thoughts through hours of travelling can be compressed into 
a few sentences, which are only like the list of names telling 
you what are the scenes in a long, long panorama, full of 
colour, of detail, and of life. The happy faces Arthur saw 
greeting him were not pale abstractions, but real ruddy 
faces, long familiar to him : Martin Poyser was there, — 
the whole Poyser family. 

What — Hetty ? 

Yes; for Arthur was at ease about Hetty, — not quite at 
ease about the past, for a certain burning of the ears would 
come whenever he thought of the scenes with Adam last 
August, but at ease about her present lot. Mr. Irwine, who 
had been a regular correspondent, telling him all the news 
about the old places and people, had sent him word nearly 
three months ago that Adam Bede was not to marry Mary 
Burge, as he had thought, but pretty Hetty Sorrel. Martin 
Poyser and Adam himself had both told Mr. Irwine all 
about it, — that Adam had been deeply in love with Hetty 
these two years, and that now it was agreed they were to 
be married in March. That stalwart rogue Adam was more 
susceptible than the Rector had thought ; it was really quite 
an idyllic love affair ; and if it had not been too long to tell 

443 


ADAM BEDE 


in a letter, he would have liked to describe to Arthur the 
blushing looks and the simple strong words with which the 
line, honest fellow told his secret. He knew Arthur would 
like to hear that Adam had this sort of happiness in pros- 
pect. 

Yes, indeed! Arthur felt there was not air enough in the 
room to satisfy his renovated life, when he had read that 
passage in the letter. He threw up the windows ; he rushed 
out of doors into the December air, and greeted every one 
who spoke to him with an eager gayety, as if there had been 
news of a fresh Nelson victory. For the first time that day 
since he had come to Windsor, he was in true boyish spirits: 
the load that had been pressing upon him was gone; the 
haunting fear had vanished. He thought he could conquer 
his bitterness towards Adam now, — could offer him his 
hand, and ask to be his friend again, in spite of that pain- 
ful memory which would still make his ears burn. He had 
been knocked down, and he had been forced to tell a lie: 
such things make a scar, do what we will. But if Adam were 
the same again as in the old days, Arthur wished to be the 
same too, and to have Adam mixed up with his business and 
his future, as he had always desired before that accursed 
meeting in August. Nay, he would do a great deal more 
for Adam than he should otherwise have done, when he 
came into the estate ; Hetty’s husband had a special claim 
on him, — Hetty herself should feel that any pain she had 
suffered through Arthur in the past was compensated to her 
a hundredfold. For really she could not have felt much, 
since she had so soon made up her mind to marry Adam. 

You perceive clearly what sort of picture Adam and Hetty 
made in the panorama of Arthur’s thoughts on his journey 
homeward. It was March now ; they were soon to be mar- 
ried : perhaps they were already married. And now it was 
actually in his power to do a great deal for them. Sweet — 
sweet little Hetty! The little puss hadn’t cared for him 
half as much as he cared for her; for he was a great fool 
about her still, — was almost afraid of seeing her, — indeed, 
had not cared much to look at any other woman since he 
parted from her. That little figure coming towards him in 
the Grove, those dark-fringed childish eyes, the lovely lips 

444 


ARTHUR’S RETURN 


put up to kiss him, — that picture had got no fainter with 
the lapse of months. And she would look just the same. It 
was impossible to think how he could meet her, — he should 
certainly tremble. Strange, how long this sort of influence 
lasts ; for he was certainly not in love with Hetty now, — 
he had been earnestly desiring, for months, that she should 
marry Adam, and there was nothing that contributed more 
to his happiness in these moments than the thought of their 
marriage. It was the exaggerating effect of imagination 
that made his heart still beat a little more quickly at the 
thought of her. When he saw the little thing again as she 
really was, as Adam’s wife, at work quite prosaically in her 
new home, he should perhaps wonder at the possibility of his 
past feelings. Thank Heaven it had turned out so well! 
He should have plenty of affairs and interests to fill his life 
now, and not be in danger of playing the fool again. 

Pleasant the crack of the postboy’s whip I Pleasant the 
sense of being hurried along in swift ease through English 
scenes, so like those round his own home, only not quite 
so charming! Here was a market-town, — very much like 
Treddleston, — where the arms of the neighbouring lord of 
the manor were borne on the sign of the principal inn, then 
mere fields and hedges, their vicinity to a market-town 
carrying an agreeable suggestion of high rent, till the land 
began to assume a trimmer look, the woods were more fre- 
quent, and at length a white or red mansion looked down 
from a moderate eminence, or allowed him to be aware of its 
parapet and chimneys among the dense-looking masses of 
oaks and elms, — masses reddened now with early buds. 
And close at hand came the village, — the small church, with 
its red-tiled roof, looking humble even among the faded half- 
timbered houses : the old green gravestones with nettles 
round them; nothing fresh and bright but the children, 
opening round eyes at the swift post-chaise ; nothing noisy 
and busy but the gaping curs of mysterious pedigree. What 
a much prettier village Hayslope was ! And it should not be 
neglected like this place : vigorous repairs should go on 
everywhere among farm-buildings and cottages : and travel- 
lers in post-chaises, coming along the Rosseter road, should 
do nothing but admire as they went. And Adam Bede 

445 


ADAM BEDE 


should superintend all the repairs, for he had a share in 
Burge’s business now, and, if he liked, Arthur would put 
some money into the concern, and buy the old man out in 
another year or two. That was an ugly fault in Arthur’s 
life, that affair last summer ; but the future should make 
amends. Many men would have retained a feeling of vin- 
dictiveness towards Adam ; but he would not, — he would 
resolutely overcome all littleness of that kind, for he had 
certainly been very much in the wrong; and though Adam 
had been harsh and violent, and had thrust on him a painful 
dilemma, the poor fellow was in love and had real provoca- 
tion. No ; Arthur had not an evil feeling in his mind to- 
wards any human being: he was happy, and would make 
every one else happy that came within his reach. 

And here was dear old Hayslope at last, sleeping on the 
hill, like a quiet old place as it was, in the late afternoon sun- 
light; and opposite to it the great shoulders of the Binton 
Hills, below them the purplish blackness of the hanging 
woods, and at last the pale front of the Abbey, looking out 
from among the oaks of the Chase, as if anxious for the 
heir’s return. ‘‘ Poor grandfather ! and he lies dead there. 
He was a young fellow once, coming into the estate, and 
making his plans. So the world goes round! Aunt Lydia 
must feel very desolate, poor thing ! but she shall be indulged 
as much as she indulges her fat Fido.” 

The wheels of Arthur’s chaise had been anxiously lis- 
tened for at the Chase; for to-day was Friday, and the fu- 
neral had already been deferred two days. Before it drew 
up on the gravel of the courtyard, all the servants in the 
house were assembled to receive him with a grave, decent 
welcome, befitting a house of death. A month ago, perhaps, 
it would have been difficult for them to have maintained a 
suitable sadness in their faces, when Mr. Arthur was come 
to take possession ; but the hearts of the head-servants were 
heavy that day for another cause than the death of the old 
Squire, and more than one of them was longing to. be 
twenty miles away, as Mr. Craig was, knowing what was to 
become of Hetty Sorrel, — pretty Hetty Sorrel, whom they 
used to see every week. They had the partisanship of house- 
hold servants who like their places, and were not inclined to 

446 


ARTHUR’S RETURN 


go the full length of the vSevere indignation felt against him 
by the farming tenants, but rather to make excuses for him ; 
nevertheless, the upper servants, who had been on terms of 
neighbourly intercourse with the Poysers for many years, 
could not help feeling that the longed-for event of the young 
Squire’s coming into the estate had been robbed of all its 
pleasantness. 

To Arthur it was nothing surprising that the servants 
looked grave and sad ; he himself was very much touched 
on seeing them all again, and feeling that he was in a new 
relation to them. It was that sort of pathetic emotion which 
has more pleasure than pain in it, — which is perhaps one 
of the most delicious of all states to a good-natured man, 
conscious of the power to satisfy his good-nature. His heart 
swelled agreeably as he said, — 

“ Well, Mills, how is my aunt? ” 

But now Mr. Bygate the lawyer, who had been in the 
house ever since the death, came forward to give deferential 
greetings and answer all questions ; and Arthur walked with 
him towards the library, where his aunt Lydia was expect- 
ing him. Aunt Lydia was the only person in the house who 
knew nothing about Hetty. Her sorrow as a maiden daugh- 
ter was unmixed with any other thoughts than those of anx- 
iety about funeral arrangements and her own future lot ; and 
after the manner of women, she mourned for the father who 
had made her life important, all the more because she had a 
secret sense that there was little mourning for him in other 
hearts. 

But Arthur kissed her tearful face more tenderly than he 
had ever done in his life before. 

Dear aunt,” he said affectionately, as he held her hand, 
your loss is the greatest of all ; but you must tell me how 
to try and make it up to you all the rest of your life.” 

“ It was so sudden and so dreadful, Arthur,” poor Miss 
Lydia began, pouring out her little plaints ; and Arthur sat 
down to listen with impatient patience. When a pause came, 
he said, — 

“ Now, aunt, I ’ll leave you for a quarter of an hour just 
to go to my own room, and then I shall come and give full 
attention to everything. 


447 


ADAM BEDE 

My room is all ready for me, I suppose, Mills? '' he said 
to the butler, who seemed to be lingering uneasily about the 
entrance-hall. 

“ Yes, sir, and there are letters for you ; they are all laid 
on the writing-table in your dressing-room.’’ 

On entering the small anteroom which was called a dress- 
ing-room, but which Arthur really used only to lounge and 
write in, he just cast his eyes on the writing-table, and saw 
that there were several letters and packets lying there ; but 
he was in the uncomfortable dusty condition of a man who 
has had a long hurried journey, and he must really refresh 
himself by attending to his toilet a little, before he read his 
letters. Pym was there, making everything ready for him ; 
and soon, with a delightful freshness about him, as if he 
were prepared to begin a new day, he went back into his 
dressing-room to open his letters. The level rays of the low 
afternoon sun entered directly at the window ; and as Arthur 
seated himself in his velvet chair with their pleasant warmth 
upon him, he was conscious of that quiet well-being which 
perhaps you and I have felt on a sunny afternoon, when in 
our brightest youth and health life has opened a new vista 
for us, and long to-morrows of activity have stretched before 
us like a lovely plain which there was no need for hurrying 
to look at, because it was all our own. 

The top letter was placed with its address upwards; it 
was in Mr. Irwine’s handwriting, Arthur saw at once ; and 
below the address was written, “To be delivered as soon as 
he arrives.” Nothing could have been less surprising to him 
than a letter from Mr. Irwine at that moment ; of course 
there was something he wished Arthur to know earlier than 
it was possible for them to see each other. At such a time 
as that it was quite natural that Irwine should have some- 
thing pressing to say. Arthur broke the seal with an agree- 
able anticipation of soon seeing the writer. 

“ I send this letter to meet you on your arrival, Arthur, because I 
may then be at Stoniton, whither I am called by the most painful 
duty it has ever been given me to perform; and it is right that you 
should know what I have to tell you without delay. 

“ I will not attempt to add by one word of reproach to the retri- 
bution that is now falling on you; any other words that I could write 

448 


IN THE PRISON 


at this moment must be weak and unmeaning by the side of those in 
which I must tell you the simple fact. 

“ Hetty Sorrel is in prison, and will be tried on Friday for the 
crime of child-murder.” 

Arthur read no more. Pie started up from his chair, and 
stood for a single minute with a sense of violent convulsion 
in his whole frame, as if the life were going out of him with 
horrible throbs ; but the next minute he had rushed out of 
the room, still clutching the letter, — he was hurrying along 
the corridor, and down the stairs into the hall. Mills was 
still there; but Arthur did not see him, as he passed like a 
hunted man across the hall and out along the gravel. The 
butler hurried out after him as fast as his elderly limbs could 
run ; he guessed, he knew, where the young Squire was 
going. 

When Mills got to the stables, a horse was being saddled, 
and Arthur was forcing himself to read the remaining words 
of the letter. He thrust it into his pocket as the horse was 
led up to him, and at that moment caught sight of Mills's 
anxious face in front of him. 

“ Tell them I 'm gone, — gone to Stoniton,” he said in a 
muffled tone of agitation ; sprang into the saddle, and set off 
at a gallop. 


CHAPTER XLV. 

IN THE PRISON. 

N ear sunset that evening an elderly gentleman was 
standing with his back against the smaller entrance- 
door of Stoniton jail, saying a few last words to the depart- 
ing chaplain. The chaplain walked away; but the elderly 
gentleman stood still, looking down on the pavement, and 
stroking his chin with a ruminating air, when he was roused 
by a sweet, clear woman's voice, saying, — 

“ Can I get into the prison, if you please ? ” 

He turned his head, and looked fixedly at the speaker for 
a few moments without answering. 

I have seen you before," he said at last. Do you re- 

449 


29 


ADAM BEDE 


member preaching on the village green at Hayslope in 
Loamshire ? ” 

Yes, sir, surely. Are you the gentleman that stayed to 
listen on horseback ? 

Yes. Why do you want to go into the prison? ” 

“ I want to go to« Hetty Sorrel, the young woman who 
has been condemned to death, — and to stay with her, if I 
may be permitted. Have you power in the prison, sir ? 

Yes ; I am a magistrate, and can get admittance for you. 
But did you know this criminal, Hetty Sorrel? ” 

Yes, we are kin; my own aunt married her uncle, Mar- 
tin Poyser. But I was away at Leeds, and did n’t know of 
this great trouble in time to get here before to-day. I en- 
treat you, sir, for the love of our Heavenly Father, to let me 
go to her and stay with her.” 

How did you know she was condemned to death, if you 
are only just come from Leeds? ” 

“ I have seen my uncle since the trial, sir. He is gone back 
to his home now, and the poor sinner is forsaken of all. I 
beseech you to get leave for me to be with her.” 

“ What ! have you courage to stay all night in the prison ? 
She is very sullen, and will scarcely make answer when she 
is spoken to.” 

‘‘ Oh, sir, it may please God to open her heart still. Don’t 
let us delay.” 

‘‘ Come, then,” said the elderly gentleman, ringing and 
gaining admission ; “ I know you have a key to unlock 
hearts.” 

Dinah mechanically took off her bonnet and shawl as soon 
as they were within the prison court, from the habit she had 
of throwing them off when she preached or prayed, or vis- 
ited the sick; and when they entered the jailer’s room, she 
laid them down on a chair unthinkingly. There was no agi- 
tation visible in her, but a deep, concentrated calmness, as if, 
even when she was speaking, her soul was in prayer reposing 
on an unseen support. 

After speaking to the jailer, the magistrate turned to her 
and said : The turnkey will take you to the prisoner’s cell, 
and leave you there for the night, if you desire it ; but you 
can’t have a light during the night, — it is contrary to rules. 

450 


IN THE PRISON 


My name is Colonel Townley ; if I can help you in anything, 
ask the jailer for my address, and come to me. I take some 
interest in this Hetty Sorrel, for the sake of that fine fellow, 
Adam Bede: I happened to see him at Hayslope the same 
evening I heard you preach, and recognized him in court to- 
day, ill as he looked.^’ 

“ Ah, sir, can you tell me anything about him ? Can you 
tell me where he lodges? For my poor uncle was too much 
weighed down with trouble to remember.” 

“ Close by here. I inquired all about him of Mr. Irwine. 
He lodges over a tinman’s shop in the street on the right 
hand as you entered the prison. There is an old schoolmas- 
ter with him. Now good-by. I wish you success.” 

“ Farewell, sir. I am grateful to you.” 

As Dinah crossed the prison court with the turnkey, the 
solemn evening light seemed to make the walls higher than 
they were by day, and the sweet pale face in the cap was 
more than ever like a white flower on this background of 
gloom. The turnkey looked askance at her all the while, but 
never spoke ; he somehow felt that the sound of his own rude 
voice would be grating just then. He struck a light as they 
entered the dark corridor leading to the condemned cell, and 
then said in his most civil tone, — 

“ It ’ll be pretty nigh dark in the cell a’ready ; but I can 
stop with my light a bit, if you like.” 

Nay, friend, thank you,” said Dinah. '' I wish to go in 
alone.” 

As you like,” said the jailer, turning the harsh key in 
the lock, and opening the door wide enough to admit Dinah. 
A jet of light from his lantern fell on the opposite corner of 
the cell, where Hetty was sitting on her straw pallet with her 
face buried in her knees. It seemed as if she were asleep, and 
yet the grating of the lock would have been likely to awaken 
her. 

The door closed again, and the only light in the cell was 
that of the evening sky, through the small high grating, — 
enough to discern human faces by. Dinah stood still for a 
minute, hesitating to speak, because Hetty might be asleep, 
and looking at the motionless heap with a yearning heart. 
Then she said softly, — 


451 


ADAM BEDE 


“ Hetty ! ’^ 

There was a slight movement perceptible in Hetty’s frame, 
— a start such as might have been produced by a feeble elec- 
trical shock ; but she did not look up. Dinah spoke again, 
in a tone made stronger by irrepressible emotion, — 

‘‘ Hetty ... it ’s Dinah.” 

Again there was a slight, startled movement through 
Hetty’s frame ; and without uncovering her face, she raised 
her head a little, as if listening. 

“ Hetty . . . Dinah is come to you.” 

After a moment’s pause Hetty lifted her head slowly and 
timidly from her knees, and raised her eyes. The two pale 
faces were looking at each other, — one with a wild, hard 
despair in it ; the other full of sad, yearning love. Dinah un- 
consciously opened her arms and stretched them out. 

“ Don’t you know me, Hetty ? Don’t you remember 
Dinah? Did you think I would n’t come to you in trouble? ” 

Hetty kept her eyes fixed on Dinah’s face, — at first like 
an animal that gazes, and gazes, and keeps aloof. 

“ I ’m come to be with you, Hetty, — not to leave you, — 
to stay with you, — to be your sister to the last.” 

Slowly, while Dinah was speaking, Hetty rose, took a step 
forward, and was clasped in Dinah’s arms. 

They stood so a long while, for neither of them felt the 
impulse to move apart again. Hetty, without any distinct 
thought of it, hung on this something that was come to 
clasp her now, while she was sinking helpless in a dark gulf ; 
and Dinah felt a deep joy in the first sign that her love was 
welcomed by the wretched lost one. The light got fainter as 
they, stood ; and when at last they sat down on the straw pal- 
let together, their faces had become indistinct. 

Not a word was spoken. Dinah waited, hoping for a 
spontaneous word from Hetty ; but she sat in the same dull 
despair, only clutching the hand that held hers, and leaning 
her cheek against Dinah’s. It was the human contact she 
clung to, but she was not the less sinking into the dark gulf. 

Dinah began to doubt whether Hetty was conscious who 
it was that sat beside her. She thought suffering and fear 
might have driven the poor sinner out of her mind. But it 
was borne in upon her, as she afterwards said, that she must 

452 


Dinah unconsciously opened her arms and stretched them out 





IN THE PRISON 


not hurry God’s work ; we are over-hasty to speak, — as if 
God did not manifest himself by our silent feeling, and make 
his love felt through ours. She did not know how long they 
sat in that way, but it got darker and darker, till there was 
only a pale patch of light on the opposite wall ; all the rest 
was darkness. But she felt the Divine presence more and 
more, — nay, as if she herself were a part of it, and it was 
the Divine pity that was beating in her heart, and was will- 
ing the rescue of this helpless one. At last she was prompted 
to speak, and find out how far Hetty was conscious of the 
present. 

'' Hetty,” she said gently, “ do you know who it is that sits 
by your side ? ” 

Yes,” Hetty answered slowly; “ it ’s Dinah.” 

And do you remember the time when we were at the 
Hall Farm together, and that night when I told you to be 
sure and think of me as a friend in trouble ? ” 

“ Yes,” said Hetty. Then, after a pause, she added : “ But 
you can do nothing for me. You can’t make ’em do any- 
thing. They ’ll hang me o’ Monday, — it ’s Friday now.” 

As Hetty said the last words, she clung closer to Dinah, 
shuddering. 

No, Hetty, I can’t save you from that death. But is n’t 
the suffering less hard when you have somebody with you 
that feels for you, — that you can speak to, and say what ’s 
in your heart? ... Yes, Hetty; you lean on me; you are 
glad to have me with you.” 

'' You won’t leave me, Dinah ? You ’ll keep close to me ? ” 

No, Hetty, I won’t leave you. I ’ll stay with you to the 
last. . . . But, Hetty, there is some one else in this cell be- 
sides me, some one close to you.” 

Hetty said, in a frightened whisper, Who ? ” 

“ Some one who has been with you through all your 
hours of sin and trouble, — who has known every thought 
you have had, — ha§ seen where you went, where you lay 
down and rose up again, and all the deeds you have tried to 
hide in darkness. And on Monday, when I can’t follow you, 
— when my arms can’t reach you, — when death has parted 
us, — He who is with us now, and knows all, will be with 

453 


ADAM BEDE 


you then. It makes no difference, — whether we live or die, 
we are in the presence of God.’^ 

“Oh, Dinah, won’t nobody do anything for me? Will 
they hang me for certain ? . . . I would n’t mind if they ’d 
let me live.” 

“ My poor Hetty, death is very dreadful to you. I know 
it ’s dreadful. But if you had a friend to take care of you 
after death, — in that other world, — some one whose love 
is greater than mine, who can do everything? ... If God 
our Father was your friend, and was willing to save you 
from sin and suffering, so as you should neither know wicked 
feelings nor pain again? If you could believe he loved you 
and would help you, as you believe I love you and will help 
you, it would n’t be so hard to die on Monday, would it ? ” 

“ But I can’t know anything about it,” Hetty said, with 
sullen sadness. 

“ Because, Hetty, you are shutting up your soul against 
him, by trying to hide the truth. God’s love and mercy can 
overcome all things, — our ignorance and weakness, and all 
the burthen of our past wickedness, — all things but our 
wilful sin ; sin that we cling to, and will not give up. You 
believe in my love and pity for you, Hetty ; but if you had 
not let me come near you, if you would n’t have looked at 
me or spoken to me, you ’d have shut me out from helping 
you : I could n’t have made you feel my love ; I could n’t 
have told you what I felt for you. Don’t shut God’s love out 
in that way, by clinging to sin. . . . He can’t bless you 
while you have one falsehood in your soul; his pardoning 
mercy can’t reach you until you open your heart to him, and 
say, ‘ I have done this great wickedness ; O God, save me, 
make me pure from sin.’ While you cling to one sin and 
will not part with it, it must drag you down to misery after 
death, as it has dragged you to misery here in this world, my 
poor, poor Hetty ! It is sin that brings dread and darkness 
and despair ; there is light and blessedness for us as soon as 
we cast it off. God enters our souls then, and teaches us, 
and brings us strength and peace. Cast it off now, Hetty, 
— now; confess the wickedness you have done, — the sin 
you have been guilty of against your Heavenly Father. Let 
us kneel down together, for we are in the presence of God.” 

454 


IN THE PRISON 


Hetty obeyed Dinah’s movement, and sank on her knees. 
They still held each other’s hands, and there was long si- 
lence. Then Dinah said, — 

Hetty, we are before God ; he is waiting for you to tell 
the truth.” 

Still there was silence. At last Hetty spoke, in a tone of 
beseeching, — 

“ Dinah . . . help me ... I can’t feel anything like you 
. . . my heart is hard.” 

Dinah held the clinging hand, and all her soul went forth 
in her voice : — 

Jesus, thou present Saviour ! Thou hast known the 
depths of all sorrow, — thou hast entered that black dark- 
ness where God is not, and hast uttered the cry of the for- 
saken. Come, Lord, and gather of the fruits of thy travail 
and thy pleading; stretch forth thy hand, thou who art 
mighty to save to the uttermost, and rescue this lost one. 
She is clothed round with thick darkness ; the fetters of her 
sin are upon her, and she cannot stir to come to thee : she 
can only feel her heart is hard, and she is helpless. She cries 
to me, thy weak creature. . . . Saviour! it is a blind cry to 
thee. Hear it I Pierce the darkness ! Look upon her with 
thy face of love and sorrow, that thou didst turn on him 
who denied thee ; and melt her hard heart. 

“ See, Lord, — I bring her, as they of old brought the sick 
and helpless, and thou didst heal them; I bear her on my 
arms and carry her before thee. Fear and trembling have 
taken hold on her; but she trembles only at the pain and 
death of the body; breathe upon her thy life-giving Spirit, 
and put a new fear within her, — the fear of her sin. Make 
her dread to keep the accursed thing within her soul : make 
her feel the presence of the living God, who beholds all the 
past, to whom the darkness is as noonday; who is waiting 
now, at the eleventh hour, for her to turn to him, and con- 
fess her sin, and cry for mercy, — now, before the night of 
death comes, and the moment of pardon is forever fled, like 
yesterday that returneth not. 

“ Saviour 1 it is yet time, — time to snatch this poor soul 
from everlasting darkness. I believe — I believe in thy in- 
finite love. What is my love or my pleading ? It is quenched 

455 


ADAM BEDE 


in thine. I can only clasp her in my weak arms, and urge 
her with my weak pity. Thou — thou wilt breathe on the 
dead soul, and it shall arise from the unanswering sleep of 
death. 

'‘Yea, Lord, I see thee coming through the darkness, 
coming, like the morning, with healing on thy wings. The 
marks of thy agony are upon thee, — I see, I see thou art 
able and willing to save, — thou wilt not let her perish for- 
ever. 

“ Come, mighty Saviour ! let the dead hear thy voice ; let 
the eyes of the blind be opened. Let her see that God en- 
compasses her ; let her tremble at nothing but at the sin that 
cuts her off from him. Melt the hard heart; unseal the 
closed lips. Make her cry with her whole soul, ‘ Father, I 
have sinned ’ — ” 

“ Dinah,” Hetty sobbed out, throwing her arms round 
Dinah’s neck, “ I will speak ... I will tell ... I won’t 
hide it any more.” 

But the tears and sobs were too violent. Dinah raised her 
gently from her knees, and seated her on the pallet again, 
sitting down by her side. It was a long time before the con- 
vulsed throat was quiet, and even then they sat some time in 
stillness and darkness, holding each other’s hands. At last 
Hetty whispered, — 

“ I did do it, Dinah ... I buried it in the wood . . . the 
little baby . . . and it cried ... I heard it cry . . . ever 
such a way off . . . all night . . . and I went back because 
it cried.” 

She paused, and then spoke hurriedly in a louder, pleading 
tone. 

“ But I thought perhaps it would n’t die, — there might 
somebody find it. I did n’t kill it, — I did n’t kill it myself. 
I put it down there and covered it up, and when I came 
back it was gone. ... It was because I was so very misera- 
ble, Dinah ... I did n’t know where to go . . . and I 
tried to kill myself before, and I could n’t. Oh, I tried so 
to drown myself in the pool, and I could n’t. I went to 
Windsor — I ran away — did you know ? I went to find 
him, as he might take care of me; and he was gone; and 
then I did n’t know what to do. I dared n’t go back home 

456 


IN THE PRISON 


again, — I could n’t bear it. I could n’t have bore to look at 
anybody, for they ’d have scorned me. I thought o’ you 
sometimes, and thought I ’d come to you, for I did n’t think 
you ’d be cross with me, and cry shame on me : I thought 
I could tell you. But then the other folks ’ud come to know 
it at last, and I could n’t bear that. It was partly thinking 
o’ you made me come toward Stoniton ; and, besides, I was 
so frightened at going wandering about till I was a beggar- 
woman, and had nothing; and sometimes it seemed as if I 
must go back to the Farm sooner than that. Oh, it was so 
dreadful, Dinah ... I was so miserable ... I wished I ’d 
never been born into this world. I should never like to go 
into the green fields again, — I hated ’em so in my misery.” 

Hetty paused again, as if the sense of the past were too 
strong upon her for words. 

“ And then I got to Stoniton, and I began to feel fright- 
ened that night, because I was so near home. And then the 
little baby was born, when I did n’t expect it ; and the 
thought came into my mind that I might get rid of it, and 
go home again. The thought came all of a sudden, as I was 
lying in the bed, and it got stronger and stronger ... I 
longed so to go back again ... I could n’t bear being so 
lonely, and coming to beg for want. And it gave me 
strength and resolution to get up and dress myself. I felt I 
must do it ... I did n’t know how ... I thought I ’d find 
a pool, if I could, like that other, in the corner of the field, 
in the dark. And when the woman went out, I felt as if I 
was strong enough to do anything ... I thought I should 
get rid of all my misery, and go back home, and never let 
’em know why I ran away. I put on my bonnet and shawl, 
and went out into the dark street, with the baby under my 
cloak ; and I walked fast till I got into a street a good way 
off, and there was a public, and I got some warm stuff to 
drink and some bread. And I walked on and on, and I 
hardly felt the ground I trod on ; and it got lighter, for there 
came the moon — Oh, Dinah, it frightened me when it first 
looked at me out o’ the clouds, — it never looked so before ; 
and I turned out of the road into the fields, for I was afraid 
o’ meeting anybody with the moon shining on me. And I 
came to a haystack, where I thought I could lie down and 

457 


ADAM BEDE 


keep myself warm all night. There was a place cut into it, 
where I could make me a bed; and I lay comfortable, and 
the baby was warm against me; and I must have gone to 
sleep, for a good while, for when I woke it was morning, 
but not very light, and the baby was crying. And I saw a 
wood a little way off ... I thought there ’d perhaps be a 
ditch or a pond there . . . and it was so early I thought I 
could hide the child there, and get a long way off before 
folks was up. And then I thought I ’d go home, — I ’d get 
rides in carts and go home, and tell ’em I ’d been to try and 
see for a place, and couldn’t get one. I longed so for it, 
Dinah, I longed so to be safe at home. I don’t know how 
I felt about the baby. I seemed to hate it, — it was like a 
heavy weight hanging round my neck; and yet its crying 
went through me, and I dared n’t look at its little hands and 
face. But I went on to the wood, and I walked about, but 
there was no water — ” 

Hetty shuddered. She was silent for some moments, and 
when she began again, it was in a whisper. 

“ I came to a place where there was lots of chips and turf, 
and I sat down on the trunk of a tree to think what I should 
do. And all of a sudden I saw a hole under the nut-tree, 
like a little grave. And it darted into me like lightning, — 
I ’d lay the baby there, and cover it with the grass and the 
chips. I could n’t kill it any other way. And I ’d done it in 
a minute ; and, oh, it cried so, Dinah, — I could n't cover it 
quite up, — I thought perhaps somebody ’ud come and take 
care of it, and then it would n’t die. And I made haste out 
of the wood, but I could hear it crying all the while ; and 
when I got out into the fields, is was as if I was held fast, — I 
could n’t go away, for all I wanted so to go. And I sat 
against the haystack to watch if anybody ’ud come; I was 
very hungry, and I ’d only a bit of bread left ; but I could n't 
go away. And after ever such a while, — hours and hours, 
— the man came, — him in a smock-frock, and he looked at 
me so, I was frightened, and I made haste and went on. I 
thought he was going to the wood, and would perhaps find 
the baby. And I went right on, till I came to a village, a 
long way off from the wood ; and I was very sick and faint 
and hungry. I got something to eat there, and bought a 

458 


IN THE PRISON 


loaf. But I was frightened to stay. I heard the baby cry- 
ing, and thought the other folks heard it too, — and I went 
on. But I was so tired, and it was getting towards dark. 
And at last, by the roadside there was a barn, — ever such a 
way off any house, — like the barn in Abbot’s Close ; 
and I thought I could go in there and hide myself among 
the hay and straw, and nobody ’ud be likely to come. I 
went in, and it was half full o’ trusses of straw, and there 
was some hay too. And I made myself a bed, ever so far 
behind, where nobody could find me ; and I was so tired and 
weak, I went to sleep. . . . But oh, the baby’s crying kept 
waking me ; and I thought that man as looked at me so was 
come and laying hold of me. But I must have slept a long 
while at last, though I did n’t know ; for when I got up and 
went out of the barn, I did n’t know whether it was night or 
morning. But it was morning, for it kept getting lighter; 
and I turned back the way I ’d come. I could n’t help it, 
Dinah, — it was the baby’s crying made me go; and yet I 
was frightened to death. I thought that man in the smock- 
frock ’ud see me, and know I put the baby there. But I went 
on, for all that. I ’d left off thinking about going home, — 
it had gone out o’ my mind. I saw nothing but that place 
in the wood where I ’d buried the baby ... I see it now. 
O Dinah ! shall I allays see it ? ” 

Hetty clung round Dinah, and shuddered again. The 
silence seemed long before she went on. 

I met nobody, for it was very early, and I got into the 
wood. ... I knew the way to the place . . . the place 
against the nut-tree ; and I could hear it crying at every step. 
... I thought it was alive. ... I don’t know whether I was 
frightened or glad ... I don’t know what I felt. I only 
know I was in the wood, and heard the cry. I don’t know 
what I felt till I saw the baby was gone. And when I ’d 
put it there, I thought I should like somebody to find it, and 
save it from dying ; but when I saw it was gone, I was struck 
like a stone, with fear. I never thought o’ stirring, I felt so 
weak. I knew I could n’t run away, and everybody as saw 
^ ^ vvie ’ud know about the baby. My heart went like a stone : 
j satould n’t wish or try for anything ; it seemed like as if I 
f 



ADAM BEDE 


should stay there forever, and nothing ’ud ever change. But 
they came and took me away.'’ 

Hetty was silent ; but she shuddered again, as if there was 
still something behind ; and Dinah waited, for her heart was 
so full that tears must come before words. At last Hetty 
burst out, with a sob, — 

“ Dinah, do you think God will take away that crying 
and the place in the wood, now I Ve told you everything? " 

“ Let us pray, poor sinner ; let us fall on our knees again, 
and pray to the God of all mercy." 


CHAPTER XLVL 

THE HOURS OF SUSPENSE. 

O N Sunday morning, when the church bells in Stoniton 
were ringing for morning service, Bartle Massey re- 
entered Adam’s room after a short absence and said, — 
Adam, her ’s a visitor wants to see you.’’ 

Adam was seated with his back towards the door; but 
he started up and turned round instantly, with a flushed face 
and an eager look. His face was even thinner and more 
worn than we have seen it before, but he was washed and 
shaven this Sunday morning. 

“ Is it any news? ’’ he said. 

“ Keep yourself quiet, my lad,’’ said Bartle ; “ keep quiet. 
It ’s not what you ’re thinking of ; it ’s the young Methodist 
woman come from the prison. She ’s at the bottom o’ the 
stairs, and wants to know if you think well to see her, for 
she has something to say to you about that poor castaway ; 
but she would n’t come in without your leave, she said. She 
thought you ’d perhaps like to go out and speak to her. 
These preaching women are not so back’ard commonly,’’ 
Bartle muttered to himself. 

‘‘ Ask her to come in,’’ said Adam. 

He was standing with his face towards the door; and as 
Dinah entered, lifting up her mild gray eyes towards him, 
she saw at once the great change that had come since th^' 
day when she had looked up at the tall man in the cottag^t 

460 f 


THE HOURS OF SUSPENSE 


There was a trembling in her clear voice as she put her hand 
into his and said, — 

“ Be comforted, Adam Bede ; the Lord has not forsaken 
her/' 

“ Bless you for coming to her," Adam said. '' Mr. Massey 
brought me word yesterday as you was come." 

They could neither of them say any more just yet, but 
stood before each other in silence; and Bartle Massey too, 
who had put on his spectacles, seemed transfixed, examining 
Dinah's face. But he recovered himself first, and said, “ Sit 
down, young woman, sit down," placing the chair for her, 
and retiring to his old seat on the bed. 

Thank you, friend ; I won’t sit down," said Dinah, “ for 
I must hasten back ; she entreated me not to stay long away. 
What I came for, Adam Bede, was to pray you to go and 
see the poor sinner, and bid her farewell. She desires to 
ask your forgiveness, and it is meet you should see her to- 
day rather than in the early morning, when the time will be 
short." 

Adam stood trembling, and at last sank down on his 
chair again. 

It won’t be," he said ; “ it '11 be put off, — there '11 per- 
haps come a pardon. Mr. Irwine said there was hope; he 
said I need n’t quite give it up." 

“ That 's a blessed thought to me," said Dinah, her eyes 
filling with tears. “ It 's a fearful thing hurrying her soul 
away so fast." 

“ But let what will be," she added presently, “ you will 
surely come, and let her speak the words that are in her 
heart. Although her poor soul is very dark, and discerns 
little beyond the things of the flesh, she is no longer hard ; 
she is contrite, — she has confessed all to me. The pride of 
her heart has given way, and she leans on me for help, and 
desires to be taught. This fills me with trust ; for I cannot 
but think that the brethren sometimes err in measuring the 
Divine love by the sinner's knowledge. She is going to write 
ri letter to the friends at the Hall Farm for me to give them 
'When she is gone; and when I told her you were here, she 
said, ^ I should like to say good-by to Adam, and ask him 

461 


ADAM BEDE 


to forgive me/ You will come, Adam? — perhaps you will 
even now come back with me/' 

'' I can’t," Adam said ; “ I can’t say good-by while there ’s 
any hope. I ’m listening and listening, — I can’t think o’ 
nothing but that. It can’t be as she ’ll die that shameful 
death, — I can’t bring my mind to it.’’ 

He got up from his chair again, and looked away out of 
the window, while Dinah stood with compassionate patience. 
In a minute or two he turned round and said, — 

“ I will come, Dinah . . . to-morrow morning ... if it 
must be. I may have more strength to bear it, if I know it 
must be. Tell her I forgive her ; tell her I will come, — at 
the very last.’’ 

I will not urge you against the voice of your own heart,’’ 
said Dinah. “ I must hasten back to her, for it is wonderful 
how she clings now, and was not willing to let me out of her 
sight. She used never to make any return to my affection 
before, but now tribulation has opened her heart. Farewell, 
Adam ; our Heavenly P'ather comfort you, and strengthen 
you to bear all things.’’ Dinah put out her hand, and Adam 
pressed it in silence. 

Bartle Massey was getting up to lift the stiff latch of the 
door for her; but before he could reach it, she had said 
gently. Farewell, friend,’’ and was gone, with her light 
step, down the stairs. 

“ Well,’’ said Bartle, taking off his spectacles, and putting 
them into his pocket, “ if there must be women to make 
trouble in the world, it ’s but fair there should be women to 
be comforters under it ; and she ’s one, — she ’s one. It ’s 
a pity she ’s a Methodist ; but there ’s no getting a woman 
without some foolishness or other.’’ 

Adam never went to bed that night, — the excitement of 
suspense, heightening with every hour that brought him 
nearer the fatal moment, was too great ; and in spite of his 
entreaties, in spite of his promises that he would be perfectly 
quiet, the schoolmaster watched too. 

“What does it matter to me, lad?’’ Bartle said, — “a 
night’s sleep more or less? I shall sleep long enough, 
and by, underground. Let me keep thee company in troul 


while I can." 



462 


THE HOURS OF SUSPENSE 


It was a long and dreary night in that small chamber. 
Adam would sometimes get up and tread backwards and 
forwards along the short space from wall to wall; then he 
would sit down and hide his face, and no sound would be 
heard but the ticking of the watch on the table, or the falling 
of a cinder from the fire which the schoolmaster carefully 
tended. Sometimes he would burst out into vehement 
speech, — 

“ If I could ha’ done anything to save her, — if my bear- 
ing anything would ha’ done any good . . . but t’ have to 
sit still, and know it, and do nothing ... it ’s hard for a 
man to bear . . . and to think o’ what might ha’ been now, 
if it had n’t been for him. . . . O God, it ’s the very day we 
should ha’ been married ! ” 

“ Ay, my lad,” said Bartle, tenderly, “ it ’s heavy, — it ’s 
heavy. But you must remember this: when you thought 
of marrying her, you ’d a notion she ’d got another sort of 
a nature inside her. You did n’t think she could have got 
hardened in that little while to do what she ’s done.” 

“ I know, — I know that,” said Adam. '' I thought she 
was loving and tender-hearted, and would n’t tell a lie, or act 
deceitful. How could I think any other way ? And if he ’d 
never come near her, and I ’d married her, and been loving 
to her, and took care of her, she might never ha’ done any- 
thing bad. What would it ha’ signified, — my having a bit 
o’ trouble with her ? It ’ud ha’ been nothing to this.” 

“ There ’s no knowing, my lad, — there ’s no knowing 
what might have come. The smart ’s bad for you to bear 
now ; you must have time, — you must have time. But I ’ve 
that opinion of you, that you ’ll rise above it all, and be a 
man again; and there may good come out of this that we 
don’t see.” 

Good come out of it ! ” said Adam, passionately. That 
does n’t alter th’ evil ; her ruin can’t be undone. I hate that 
talk o’ people, as if there was a way o’ making amends for 
everything. They ’d more need be brought to see as the 
wrong they do can never be altered. When a man ’s spoiled 
his fellow-creatur’s life, he ’s no right to comfort himself 
[with thinking good may come out of it; somebody else’s 
(good does n’t alter her shame and misery.” 

463 


ADAM BEDE 


“ Well, lad, well,'’ said Bartle, in a gentle tone, strangely 
in contrast with his usual peremptoriness and impatience of 
contradiction, it 's likely enough I talk foolishness ; I 'm 
an old fellow, and it 's a good many years since I was in 
trouble myself. It 's easy finding reasons why other folks 
should be patient." 

“ Mr. Massey," said Adam, penitently, “ I 'm very hot and 
hasty. I owe you something different; but you mustn't 
take it ill of me." 

Not I, lad, — not I." 

So the night wore on in agitation, till the chill dawn and 
the growing light brought the tremulous quiet that comes on 
the brink of despair. There would soon be no more sus- 
pense. 

“ Let us go to the prison now, Mr. Massey," said Adam, 
when he saw the hand of his watch at six. “ If there ’s any 
news come, we shall hear about it." 

The people were astir already, moving rapidly, in one di- 
rection, through the streets. Adam tried not to think where 
they were going, as they hurried past him in that short 
space between his lodging and the prison gates. He was 
thankful when the gates shut him in from seeing those eager 
people. 

No; there was no news come, — no pardon, — no re- 
prieve. 

Adam lingered in the court half an hour before he could 
bring himself to send word to Dinah that he was come. 
But a voice caught his ear ; he could not shut out the words. 

“ The cart is to set off at half-past seven." 

It must be said, — the last good-by ; there was no help. 

In ten minutes from that time Adam was at the door of 
the cell. Dinah'had sent him word that she could not come 
to him, she could not leave Hetty one moment ; but Hetty 
was prepared .for the meeting. 

He could not see her when he entered, for agitation dead- 
ened his senses, and the dim cell was almost dark to him. 
He stood a moment after the door closed behind him, trem-i 
bling and stupefied. 

But he began to see through the dimness, — to see the 
dark eyes lifted up to him once more, but with no smile in 

464 


THE HOURS OF SUSPENSE 


them. O God, how sad they looked ! The last time they had 
met his was when he parted from her with his heart full of 
joyous, hopeful love, and they looked out with a tearful 
smile from a pink, dimpled, childish face. The face was 
marble now ; the sweet lips were pallid and half-open and 
quivering ; the dimples were all gone, — all but one, that 
never went; and the eyes — oh! the worst of all was the 
likeness they had to Hetty’s. They were Hetty’s eyes looking 
at him with tliat mournful gaze, as if she had come back 
to him from the dead to tell him of her misery. 

She was clinging close to Dinah ; her cheek was against 
Dinah’s. It seemed as if her last faint strength and hope lay 
in that contact ; and the pitying love that shone out from 
Dinah’s face looked like a visible pledge of the Invisible 
Mercy. 

When the sad eyes met, — when Hetty and Adam looked 
at each other, — she felt the change in him too, and it seemed 
to strike her with fresh fear. It was the first time she had / 
seen any being whose face seemed to reflect the change in 
herself ; Adam was a new image of the dreadful past and the 
dreadful present. She trembled more as she looked at him. 

“ Speak to him, Hetty,” Dinah said ; “ tell him what is in 
your heart.” 

Hetty obeyed her, like a little child. 

Adam ...I’m very sorry ... I behaved very wrong 
to you . . . will you forgive me . . . before I die ? ” 

Adam answered with a half-sob: “Yes, I forgive thee, 
Hetty ; I forgave thee long ago.” 

It had seemed to Adam as if his brain would burst with 
the anguish of meeting Hetty’s eyes in the first moments ; but 
the sound of her voice uttering these penitent words touched 
a chord which had been less strained. There was a sense of 
relief from what was becoming unbearable, and the rare tears 
came, — they had never come before, since he had hung on 
Seth’s neck in the beginning of his sorrow. 

Hetty made an involuntary movement towards him ; some 
of the love that she had once lived in the midst of was come 
near her again. She kept hold of Dinah’s hand; but she 
went up to Adam and said timidly, — 

465 


30 


ADAM BEDE 


“Will you kiss me again, Adam, for all I’ve been so 
wicked ? ” 

Adam took the blanched wasted hand she put out to him, 
and they gave each other the solemn, unspeakable kiss of a 
lifelong parting. 

“ And tell him,’’ Hetty said, in rather a stronger voice, 
“ tell him ... for there ’s nobody else to tell him ... as I 
went after him and could n’t find him . . . and I hated him 
and cursed him once . . . but Dinah says, I should forgive 
him . . . and I try . . . for else God won’t forgive me.” 

There was a noise at the door of the cell now, — the key 
was being turned in the lock ; and when the door opened, 
Adam saw indistinctly that there were several faces there. 
He was too agitated to see more, — even to see that Mr. Ir- 
wine’s face was one of them. He felt that the last prepara- 
tions were beginning, and he could stay no longer. Room 
was silently made for him to depart; and he went to his 
chamber in loneliness, leaving Bartle Massey to watch and 
see the end. 


CHAPTER XLVH. 

THE LAST MOMENT. 

I T was a sight that some people remembered better even 
than their own sorrows, — the sight in that gray clear 
morning, when the fatal cart with the two young women in 
it was descried by the waiting, watching multitude, cleaving 
its way towards the hideous symbol of a deliberately in- 
flicted sudden death. 

All Stoniton had heard of Dinah Morris, the young Meth- 
odist woman who had brought the obstinate criminal to con- 
fess ; and there was as much eagerness to see her as to see 
the wretched Hetty. 

But Dinah was hardly conscious of the multitude. Wher 
Hetty had caught sight of the vast crowd in the distanc 
she had clutched Dinah convulsively. 

Close your eyes, Hetty,” Dinah said, and let us pr 
without ceasing to God.” 


466 


ANOTHER MEETING IN THE WOO- 


And in a low voice, as the cart went slowly along throu^ 
the midst of the gazing crowd, she poured forth her soui, 
with the wrestling intensity of a last pleading, for the trem- 
bling creature that clung to her and clutched her as the only 
visible sign of love and pity. 

Dinah did not know that the crowd was silent, gazing at 
her with a sort of awe, — she did not even know how near 
they were to the fatal spot, when the cart stopped, and she 
shrank appalled at a loud shout, hideous to her ear like 
a vast yell of demons. Hetty’s shriek mingled with the 
sound, and they clasped each other in mutual horror. 

But it was not a shout of execration, — not a yell of ex- 
ultant cruelty. 

It was a shout of sudden excitement at the appearance of a 
horseman cleaving the crowd at full gallop. The horse is 
hot and distressed, but answers to the desperate spurring ; 
the rider looks as if his eyes were glazed by madness, and he 
saw nothing but what was unseen by others. See, he has 
something in his hand, — he is holding it up as if it were a 
signal. 

The Sheriff knows him ; it is Arthur Donnithorne, carry- 
ing in his hand a hard-won release from death. 


CHAPTER XLVIIL 


ANOTHER MEETING IN THE WOOD. 

HE next day, at evening, two men were walking from 



1 opposite points toward the same scene, drawn thither 
by a common memory. The scene was the Grove by Donni- 
thorne Chase ; you know who the men were. 

The old Squire’s funeral had taken place that morning, the 
will had been read, and now in the first breathing-space Ar- 
thur Donnithorne had come out for a lonely walk, that he 
might look fixedly at the new future before him, and confirm 
himself in a sad resolution. He thought he could do that 
best in the Grove. 

Adam, too, had come from Stoniton on Monday evening ; 
and to-day he had not left home, except to go to the family 


467 


ADAM BEDE 


;ie Hall Farm, and tell them everything that Mr. Irwine 
.ad left untold. He had agreed with the Poysers that he 
would follow^ them to their new neighbourhood, wherever 
that might be; for he meant to give up the management of 
the woods, and, as soon as it was practicable, he would wind 
up his business with Jonathan Burge, and settle with his 
mother and Seth in a home within reach of the friends to 
whom he felt bound by a mutual sorrow. 

“ Seth and me are sure to find work,” he said. A man 
that ’s got our trade at his finger ends is at home everywhere ; 
and we must make a new start. My mother won’t stand in 
the way, for she ’s told me, since I came home, she ’d made 
up her mind to being buried in another parish, if I wished 
it, and if I ’d be more comfortable elsewhere. It ’s wonder- 
ful how quiet she ’s been ever since I came back. It seems 
as if the very greatness o’ the trouble had quieted and calmed 
her. We shall all be better in a new country ; though there ’s 
some I shall be loath to leave behind. But I won’t part from 
you and yours, if I can help it, Mr. Poyser. Trouble ’s made 
us kin.” 

“ Ay, lad,” said Martin. “We ’ll go out o’ hearing o’ that 
man’s name. But I doubt we shall ne’er go far enough for 
folks not to find out as we ’ve got them belonging to us 
as are transported o’er the seas, and were like to be hanged. 
We shall have that flyin’ up in our faces, and our children’s 
after us.” 

That was a long visit to the Hall Farm, and drew too 
strongly on Adam’s energies for him to think of seeing oth- 
ers, or re-entering on his old occupations till the morrow. 
“ But to-morrow,” he said to himself, “ I ’ll go to work 
again. I shall learn to like it again some time, maybe ; and 
it ’s right, whether I like it or not.” 

This evening was the last he would allow to be absorbed 
by sorrow; suspense was gone now, and he must bear the 
unalterable. He was resolved not to see Arthur Donni- 
thorne again, if it were possible to avoid him. He had no 
message to deliver from Hetty now, for Hetty had seen Ar- 
thur ; and Adam distrusted himself : he had learned to dread 
the violence of his own feeling. That word of Mr. Irwine’s 
— that he must remember what he had felt after giving the 

468 


ANOTHER MEETING IN THE WOOD 


last blow to Arthur in the Grove — had remained with him. 

These thoughts about Arthur, like all thoughts that are 
charged with strong feeling, were continually recurring, and 
they always called up the image of the Grove, — of that spot 
under the overarching boughs where he had caught sight 
of the two bending figures, and had been possessed by sud- 
den rage. 

“ I "11 go and see it again to-night for the last time,” he 
said ; it ’ll do me good ; it ’ll make me feel over again what 
I felt when I ’d knocked him down. I felt what poor empty 
work it was, as soon as I ’d done it, before I began to think 
he might be dead.” 

In this way it happened that Arthur and Adam were walk- 
ing towards the same spot at the same time. 

Adam had on his working-dress again now, — for he had 
thrown off the other with a sense of relief as soon as he came 
home ; and if he had had the basket of tools over his shoul- 
der, he might have been taken, with his pale wasted face, for 
the spectre of the Adam Bede who entered the Grove on 
that August evening eight months ago. But he had no basket 
of tools, and he was not walking with the old erectness, look- 
ing keenly round him ; his hands were thrust in his side pock- 
ets, and his eyes rested chiefly on the ground. He had not 
long entered the Grove, and now he paused before a beech. 
He knew that tree well ; it was the boundary mark of his 
youth, — the sign, to him, of the time when some of his 
earliest, strongest feelings had left him. He felt sure they 
would never return. And yet at this moment there was a 
stirring of affection at the remembrance of that Arthur Don- 
nithorne whom he had believed in before he had come up to 
this beech eight months ago. It was affection for the dead ; 
that Arthur existed no longer. 

He was disturbed by the sound of approaching footsteps ; 
but the beech stood at a turning in the road, and he could 
not see who was coming, until the tall slim figure in deep 
mourning suddenly stood before him at only two yards’ dis- 
tance. They both started, and looked at each other in si- 
lence. Often, in the last fortnight, Adam had imagined him- 
self as close to Arthur as this, assailing him with words that 
should be as harrowing as the voice of remorse, forcing upon 

469 


ADAM BEDE 


him a just share in the misery he had caused ; and often, too, 
he had told himself that such a meeting had better not be. 
But in imagining the meeting he had always seen Arthur, 
as he had met him on that evening in the Grove, florid, care- 
less, light of speech ; and the figure before him touched him 
with the signs of suffering. Adam knew what suffering was, 
— he could not lay a cruel finger on a bruised man. He felt 
no impulse that he needed to resist; silence was more just 
than reproach. Arthur was the first to speak. 

“ Adam,” he said quietly, it may be a good thing that we 
have met here, for I wished to see you. I should have asked 
to see you to-morrow.” 

He paused ; but Adam said nothing. 

I know it is painful to you to meet me,” Arthur went 
on ; but it is not likely to happen again for years to come.” 

“ No, sir,” said Adam, coldly, “ that was what I meant to 
write to you to-morrow, as it would be better all dealings 
should be at an end between us, and somebody else put in 
my place.” 

Arthur felt the answer keenly, and it was not without an 
effort that he spoke again. 

'' It was partly on that subject I wished to speak to you. 
I don’t want to lessen your indignation against me, or ask 
you to do anything for my sake. I only wish to ask you if 
you will help me to lessen the evil consequences of the past, 
which is unchangeable. I don’t mean consequences to my- 
self, but to others. It is but little I can do, I know. I know 
the worst consequences will remain ; but something may be 
done, and you can help me. Will you listen to me pa- 
tiently?” 

Yes, sir,” said Adam, after some hesitation ; “ I ’ll hear 
what it is. If I can help to mend anything, I will. Anger 
’ull mend nothing, I know. We ’ve had enough o’ that.” 

“ I was going to the Hermitage,” said Arthur. '' Will 
you go there with me and sit down? We can talk better 
there.” 

The Hermitage had never been entered since they left it 
together, for Arthur had locked up the key in his desk. And 
now, when he opened the door, there was the candle burnt 
out in the socket; there was the chair in the same place 

470 


ANOTHER MEETING IN THE WOOD 


where Adam remembered sitting ; there was the waste-paper 
basket full of scraps, and deep down in it, Arthur felt in an 
instant, there was the little pink silk handkerchief. It would 
have been painful to enter this place if their previous 
thoughts had been less painful. 

They sat down opposite each other in the old places, and 
Arthur said, I ’m going away, Adam ; I ’m going into the 
army.” 

Poor Arthur felt that Adam ought to be affected by this 
announcement, — ought to have a movement of sympathy 
towards him. But Adam’s lips remained firmly closed, and 
the expression of his face unchanged. 

What I want to say to you,” Arthur continued, is this : 
one of my reasons for going away is that no one else may 
leave Hayslope, — may leave their home on my account. I 
would do anything, there is no sacrifice I would not make, 
to prevent any further injury to others through my — 
through what has happened.” 

Arthur’s words had precisely the opposite effect to that he 
had anticipated. Adam thought he perceived in them that 
notion of compensation for irretrievable wrong, that self- 
soothing attempt to make evil bear the same fruits as good, 
which most of all roused his indignation. He was as strongly 
impelled to look painful facts right in the face as Arthur was 
to turn away his eyes from them. Moreover, he had the 
wakeful, suspicious pride of a poor man in the presence of a 
rich man. He felt his old severity returning as he said, — 
The time ’s past for that, sir. A man should make sacri- 
fices to keep clear of doing a wrong; sacrifices won’t undo 
it when it ’s done. When people’s feelings have got a deadly 
wound, they can’t be cured with favours.” 

Favours ! ” said Arthur, passionately ; '' no ; how can 
you suppose I meant that? But the Poysers, — Mr. Irwine 
tells me the Poysers mean to leave the place where they have 
lived so many years — for generations. Don’t you see, as 
Mr. Irwine does, that if they could be persuaded to overcome 
the feeling that drives them away, it would be much better 
for them in the end to remain on the old spot, among the 
friends and neighbours who know them ? ” 

That ’s true,” said Adam, coldly. But then, sir, folks’s 

471 


ADAM BEDE 


feelings are not so easily overcome. It ’ll be hard for Martin 
Poyser to go to a strange place, among strange faces, when 
he ’s been bred up on the Hall Farm, and his father before 
him ; but then it ’ud be harder for a man with his feelings to 
stay. I don’t see how the thing ’s to be made any other 
than hard. There ’s a sort o’ damage, sir, that can’t be made 
up for.” 

Arthur was silent some moments. In spite of other feel- 
ings dominant in him this evening, his pride winced under 
Adam’s mode of treating him. Was n’t he himself suffering? 
Was not he too obliged to renounce his most cherished 
hopes ? It was now as it had been eight months ago, — 
Adam was forcing Arthur to feel more intensely the irre- 
vocableness of his own wrong-doing ; he was presenting the 
sort of resistance that was the most irritating to Arthur’s 
eager, ardent nature. But his anger was subdued by the 
same influence that had subdued Adam’s when they first 
confronted each other, — by the marks of suffering in a 
long familiar face. The momentary struggle ended in the 
feeling that he could bear a great deal from Adam, to whom 
he had been the occasion of bearing so much ; but there was 
a touch of pleading, boyish vexation in his tone as he said, — 
But people may make injuries worse by unreasonable 
conduct, — by giving way to anger and satisfying that for 
the moment, instead of thinking what will be the effect in 
the future. 

“ If I were going to stay here and act as landlord,” he add- 
ed presently, with still more eagerness, — 'Hf I were careless 
about what I ’ve done, what I ’ve been the cause of, you 
would have some excuse, Adam, for going away and en- 
couraging others to go. You would have some excuse then 
for trying to make the evil worse. But when I tell you I ’m 
going away for years, — when you know what that means 
for me, how it cuts off every plan of happiness I ’ve ever 
formed, — it is impossible for a sensible man like you to 
believe that there is any real ground for the Poysers refus- 
ing to remain. I know their feeling about disgrace, — Mr. 
Irwine has told me all ; but he is of opinion that they might 
be persuaded out of this idea that they are disgraced in the 
eyes of their neighbours and that they can’t remain on my 

472 


ANOTHER MEETING IN THE WOOD 


estate, if you would join him in his efforts, — if you would 
stay yourself, and go on managing the old woods.” 

Arthur paused a moment, and then added pleadingly: 

You know that 's a good work to do for the sake of other 
people besides the owner. And you don’t know but that 
they may have a better owner soon whom you will like to 
work for. If I die, my cousin Tradgett will have the estate' 
and take my name. He is a good fellow.” 

Adam could not help being moved, it was impossible for 
him not to feel that this was the voice of the honest, warm- 
hearted Arthur whom he had loved and been proud of in old 
days; but nearer memories would not be thrust away. He 
was silent ; yet Arthur saw an answer in his face that induced 
him to go on with growing earnestness. 

“ And then, if you would talk to the Poysers, — if you 
would talk the matter over with Mr. Irwine, — he means 
to see you to-morrow, — and then if you would join your 
arguments to his to prevail on them not to go. ... I know, 
of course, that they would not accept any favour from me, — 
I mean nothing of that kind ; but I ’m sure they would suffer 
less in the end. Irwine thinks so too ; and Mr. Irwine is to 
have the chief authority on the estate, — he has consented 
to undertake that. They will really be under no man but 
one whom they respect and like. It would be the same with 
you, Adam; and it could be nothing but a desire to give 
me worse pain that could incline you to go.” 

Arthur was silent again for a little while, and then said, 
with some agitation in his voice, — 

I would n’t act so towards you, I know. If you were in 
my place and I in yours, I should try to help you to do the 
best.” 

Adam made a hasty movement on his chair, and looked 
on the ground. Arthur went on : — 

“ Perhaps you ’ve never done anything you ’ve had bitterly 
to repent of in your life, Adam ; if you had, you would be 
more generous. You would know then that it ’s worse for 
me than for you.” 

Arthur rose from his seat with the last words, and went 
to one of the windows, looking out and turning his back on 
Adam, as he continued passionately, — 

^ 473 


ADAM BEDE 


^‘Haven’t 1 loved her too? Didn’t I see her yesterday? 
Sha’n’t I carry the thought of her about with me as much 
as you will ? And don’t you think you would suffer more if 
you ’d been in fault ? ” 

There was silence for several minutes, for the struggle 
in Adam’s mind was not easily decided. Facile natures, 
whose emotions have little permanence, can hardly under- 
stand how much inward resistance he overcame before he 
rose from his seat and turned towards Arthur. Arthur heard 
the movement, and turning round, met the sad but softened 
look with which Adam said, — 

“ It ’s true what you say, sir : I ’m hard, — it ’s in my 
nature. I was too hard with my father for doing wrong. 
I ’ve been a bit hard t’ everybody but her. I felt as if no- 
body pitied her enough, — her suffering cut into me so ; and 
when I thought the folks at the Farm were too hard with 
her, I said I ’d never be hard to anybody myself again. But 
feeling overmuch about her has perhaps made me unfair to 
you. I ’ve known what it is in my life to repent and feel it ’s 
too late : I felt I ’d been too harsh to my father when he was 
gone from me, — I feel it now, when I think of him. I ’ve no 
right to be hard towards them as have done wrong and re- 
pent.” 

Adam spoke these words with the firm distinctness of a 
man who is resolved to leave nothing unsaid that he is 
bound to say ; but he went on with more hesitation, — 

“ I would n’t shake hands with you once, sir, when you 
asked me; but if you’re willing to do it now, for all I re- 
fused then — ” 

Arthur’s white hand was in Adam’s large grasp in an in- 
stant ; and with that action there was a strong rush, on both 
sides, of the old, boyish affection. 

Adam,” Arthur said, impelled to full confession now, “ it 
would ne\’^er have happened if I ’d known you loved her. 
That would have helped to save me from it. And I did 
struggle; I never meant to injure her. I deceived you 
afterwards, — and that led on to worse; but I thought it 
was forced upon me, I thought it was the best thing I could 
do. And in that letter I told her to let me know if she were 
in any trouble; don’t think I would not have done every- 

474 


ANOTHER MEETING IN THE WOOD 


thing I could. But I was all wrong from the very first, and 
horrible wrong has come of it. God knows, I M give my 
life if I could undo it.'’ 

They sat down again opposite each other, and Adam said 
tremulously, — 

“ How did she seem when you left her, sir ? " 

“ Don’t ask me, Adam,” Arthur said. “ I feel sometimes 
as if I should go mad with thinking of her looks and what 
she said to me, and then that I could n’t get a full pardon, — 
that I could n’t save her from that wretched fate of being 
transported, — that I can do nothing for her all those years, 
and she may die under it, and never know comfort any 
more.” 

“ Ah, sir,” said Adam, for the first time feeling his own 
pain merged in sympathy for Arthur, '' you and me ’ll often 
be thinking o’ the same thing, when we ’re a long way off 
one another. I ’ll pray God to help you, as I pray him to 
help me.” 

“ But there ’s that sweet woman, — that Dinah Morris,” 
Arthur said, pursuing his own thoughts, and not knowing 
what had been the sense of Adam’s words, “ she says she 
shall stay with her to the very last moment, — till she goes ; 
and the poor thing clings to her as if she found some comfort 
in her. I could worship that woman ; I don’t know what I 
should do if she were not there. Adam, you will see her 
when she comes back ; I could say nothing to her yesterday, 
— nothing of what I felt towards her. Tell her,” Arthur 
went on hurriedly, as if he wanted to hide the emotion with 
which he spoke, while he took off his chain and watch, — 
tell her I asked you to give her this in remembrance of 
me, — of the man to whom she is the one source of comfort, 
when he thinks of ... I know she does n’t care about such 
things, — or anything else I can give her for its -own sake. 
But she will use the watch, — I shall like to think of her 
using it.” 

“ I ’ll give it to her, sir,’’ Adam said, and tell her your 
words. She told me she should come back to the people at 
the Hall Farm.” 

And you will persuade the Poysers to stay, Adam ? ” 
said Arthur, reminded of the subject which both of them had 

475 


ADAM BEDE 


forgotten in the first interchange of revived friendship. “You 
will stay yourself, and help Mr. Irwine to carry out the re- 
pairs and improvements on the estate ? 

“ There 's one thing, sir, that perhaps you don’t take ac- 
count of,” said Adam, with hesitating gentleness, “ and that 
was what made me hang back longer. You see, it ’s the 
same with both me and the Poysers : if we stay, it ’s for our 
own worldly interest, and it looks as if we ’d put up with 
anything for the sake o’ that. I know that ’s what they ’ll 
feel, and I can’t help feeling a little of it myself. When folks 
have got an honourable, independent spirit, they don’t like 
to do anything that might make ’em seem base-minded.” 

“ But no one who knows you will think that, Adam ; that 
is not a reason strong enough against a course that is really 
more generous, more unselfish than the other. And it will 
be known — it shall be made known — that both you and 
the Poysers stayed at my entreaty. Adam, don’t try to 
make things worse for me! I’m punished enoughs without 
that.” 

“ No, sir, no,” Adam said, looking at Arthur with mourn- 
ful affection. “ God forbid I should make things worse for 
you. I used to wish I cotild do it, in my passion ; but that 
was when I thought you did n’t feel enough. I ’ll stay, sir ; 
I ’ll do the best I can. It ’s all I ’ve got to think of now, — 
to do my work well, and make the world a bit better place 
for them as can enjoy it.” 

“ Then we ’ll part now, Adam. You will see Mr. Irwine 
to-morrow, and consult with him about everything.” 

“ Are you going soon, sir? ” said Adam. 

“ As soon as possible, — after I ’ve made the necessari- 
arrangements. Good-by, Adam. I shall think of you go- 
ing about the old place.” 

“ Good-byj sir. God bless you.” 

The hands were clasped once more; and Adam left the 
Hermitage, feeling that sorrow was more bearable now 
hatred was gone. 

As soon as the door was closed behind him, Arthur went 
to the waste-paper basket and took out the little pink silk 
handkerchief. 


476 


BOOK VI. 


CHAPTER XLIX. 

AT THE HALL FARM. 

T he first autumnal afternoon sunshine of i8oi — more 
than eighteen months after that parting of Adam and 
Arthur in the Hermitage — was on the yard at the Hall 
Farm, and the bulldog was in one of his most excited mo- 
ments ; for it was that hour of the day when the cows were 
being driven into the yard for their afternoon milking. No 
wonder the patient beasts ran confusedly into the wrong 
places, for the alarming din of the bulldog was mingled with 
more distant sounds which the timid feminine creatures, with 
pardonable superstition, imagined also to have some relation 
to their own movements, — with the tremendous crack of 
the wagoner’s whip, the roar of his voice, and the booming 
thunder of the wagon, as it left the rick-yard empty of its 
golden load. 

The milking of the cows was a sight Mrs. Poyser loved; 
and at this hour on mild days she was usually standing at 
the house door, with her knitting in her hands, in quiet con- 
templation, only heightened to a keener interest when the 
vicious yellow cow, who had once kicked over a pailful of 
precious milk, was about to undergo the preventive punish- 
ment of having her hinder legs strapped. 

To-day, however, Mrs. Poyser gave but a divided attention 
to the arrival of the cows ; for she was in eager discussion 
with Dinah, who was stitching Mr. Poyser’s shirt-collars, and 
had borne patiently to have her thread broken three times 
by Totty pulling at her arm with a sudden insistence that she 
should look at “ Baby,” that is, at a large wooden doll with 
no legs and a long skirt, whose bald head Totty, seated in 
her small chair at Dinah’s side, was caressing and pressing 
to her fat cheek with much fervour. Totty is larger by more 

477 


ADAM BEDE 


than two years’ growth than when you first saw her, and she 
has on a black frock under her pinafore. Mrs. Poyser too 
has on a black gown, which seems to heighten the family 
likeness between her and Dinah. In other respects there is 
little outward change now discernible in our old friends, or 
in the pleasant house-place, bright with polished oak and 
pewter. 

“ I never saw the like to you, Dinah,” Mrs. Poyser was 
saying, when you ’re once took anything into your head : 
there ’s no more moving you than the rooted tree. You may 
say what you like, but I don’t believe that ’s religion ; for 
what ’s the Sermon on the Mount about, as you ’re so fond o’ 
reading to the boys, but doing what other folks ’ud have you 
do? But if it was anything unreasonable they wanted you 
to do, like taking your cloak off and giving it to ’em, or let- 
ling ’em slap you i’ the face, I dare say you ’d be ready 
enough ; it ’s only when one ’ud have you do what ’s plain* 
common-sense and good for yourself, as you ’re obstinate th’ 
other way.” 

“ Nay, dear aunt,” said Dinah, smiling slightly as she went 
on with her work, I ’m sure your wish ’ud be a reason for 
me to do anything that I did n’t feel it was wrong to do.” 

‘‘Wrong! You drive me past bearing. What is there 
wrong, I should like to know, i’ staying along wi’ your own 
friends, as are th’ happier for having you with ’em, an’ are 
willing to provide for you, even if your work did n’t more 
nor pay ’em for the bit o’ sparrow’s victual y’ eat, and the 
bit o’ rag you put on ? An’ who is it, I should like to know, 
as you ’re bound t’ help and comfort i’ the world more nor 
your own flesh and blood, — an’ me th’ only aunt you ’ve got 
above-ground, an’ am brought to the brink o’ the grave 
welly every winter as comes, an’ there ’s the child as sits be- 
side you ’ull break her little heart when you go, an’ the 
grandfather not been dead a twelvemonth, an’ your uncle 
’ull miss you so as never was, — a-lighting his pipe an’ wait- 
ing on him, an’ now I can trust you wi’ the butter, an’ have 
had all the trouble o’ teaching you, and there ’s all the sew- 
ing to be done, an’ I must have a strange gell out o’ Tred- 
dles’on to do it, — an’ all because you must go back to that 

478 


AT THE HALL FARM 


bare heap o' stones as the very crows fly over an’ won’t 
stop at.” 

“ Dear aunt Rachel,” said Dinah, looking up in Mrs. Poy- 
ser’s face, “ it ’s your kindness makes you say I ’m useful to 
you. You don’t really want me now; for Nancy and Molly 
are clever at their work, and you ’re in good health now, by 
the blessing of God, and my uncle is of a cheerful counte- 
nance again, and you have neighbours and friends not a few, 
— some of them come to sit with my uncle almost daily. In- 
deed, you will not miss me; and at Snowfield there are 
brethren and sisters in great need, who have none of those 
comforts you have around you. I feel that I am called back 
to those amongst whom my lot was first cast ; I feel drawn 
again towards the hills where I used to be blessed in carry- 
ing the word of life to the sinful and desolate.” 

“ You feel ! yes,” said Mrs. Poyser, returning from a par- 
enthetic glance at the cows. That ’s allays the reason I ’m 
to sit down wi’, when you ’ve a mind to do anything con- 
trairy. What do you want to be preaching for more than 
you ’re preaching now? Don’t you go off, the Lord knows 
where, every Sunday a-preaching and praying ? an’ have n’t 
you got Methodists enow at Treddles’on to go and look at, 
if church folks’s faces are too handsome to please you? an’ 
is n’t there them i’ this parish as you ’ve got under hand, 
and they ’re like enough to make friends wi’ Old Harry 
again as soon as your back ’s turned ? There ’s that Bessy 
Cranage, — she ’ll be flaunting i’ new finery three weeks 
after you ’re gone, I ’ll be bound ; she ’ll no more go on in 
her new ways without you, than a dog ’ull stand on its hind- 
legs when there ’s notbody looking. But I suppose it doesna 
matter so much about folks’s souls i’ this country, else you 'd 
be for staying with your own aunt, for she ’s none so good 
but what you might help her to be better.” 

There was a certain something in Mrs. Poyser’s voice just 
then, which she did not wish to be noticed; so she turned 
round hastily to look at the clock, and said : See there ! 

It ’s tea-time ; an’ if Martin ’s i’ the rick-yard, he ’ll like a 
cup. Here, Totty, my chicken, let mother put your bonnet 
on, and then you go out into the rick-yard, and see if father ’s 
there, and tell him he must n’t go away again without com- 

479 


ADAM BEDE 


ing t’ have a cup o’ tea ; and tell your brothers to come in 
too.” 

Totty trotted off in her flapping bonnet, while Mrs. Poy- 
ser set out the bright oak table, and reached down the tea- 
cups. 

“ You talk o’ them gells Nancy and Molly being clever i’ 
their work,” she began again, — “ it ’s fine talking. They ’re 
all the same, clever or stupid, — one can’t trust ’em out o’ 
one’s sight a minute. They want somebody’s eye on ’em 
constant if they ’re to be kept to their work. An’ suppose 
I ’m ill again this winter, as I was the winter before last, 
who ’s to look after ’em then, if you ’re gone ? An’ there ’s 
that blessed child, — something ’s sure t’ happen to her, — 
they ’ll let her tumble into the fire, or get at the kettle wi’ 
the boiling lard in ’t, or some mischief as ’ull lame her for 
life ; an’ it ’ll be all your fault, Dinah.” 

“ Aunt,” said Dinah, “ I promise to come back to you in 
the winter if you ’re ill. Don’t think I will ever stay away 
from you if you ’re in real want of me. But indeed it is 
needful for my own soul that I should go away from this life 
of ease and luxury, in which I have all things too richly to 
enjoy, — at least that I should go away for a short space. 
No one can know but myself what are my inward needs, and 
the besetments I am most in danger from. Your wish for 
me to stay is not a call of duty which I refuse to hearken to 
because it is against my own desires ; it is a temptation that 
I must resist, lest the love of the creature should become like 
a mist in my soul shutting out the heavenly light.” 

It passes my cunning to know what you mean by ease 
and luxury,” said Mrs. Poyser, as she cut the bread and but- 
ter. '' It ’s true there ’s good victual enough about you, as 
nobody shall ever say I don’t provide enough and to spare ; 
but if there ’s ever a bit o’ odds an’ ends as nobody else ’ud 
eat, you ’re sure to pick it out . . . But look there ! there ’s 
Adam Bede a-carrying the little ’un in. I wonder how it is 
he ’s come so early.” 

Mrs. Poyser hastened to the door for the pleasure of look- 
ing at her darling in a new position, with love in her eyes 
but reproof on her tongue. 

“ Oh, for shame, Totty ! Little gells o’ five year old 
480 


AT THE HALL FARM 


should be ashamed to be carried. Why, Adam, she ’ll break 
your arm, such a big gell as that; set her down — for 
shame ! ” 

“ Nay, nay,” said Adam, “ I can lift her with my hand, 
I ’ve no need to take my arm to it.” 

Totty, looking as serenely unconscious of remark as a fat 
white puppy, was set down at the door-place, and the 
mother enforced her reproof with a shower of kisses. 

“You’re surprised to see me at' this hour o’ the day,” 
said Adam. 

“ Yes, but come in,” said Mrs. Poyser, making way for 
him ; “ there ’s no bad news, I hope ? ” 

“ No, nothing bad,” Adam answered, as he went up to 
Dinah and put out his hand to her. She had laid down her 
work and stood up, instinctively, as he approached her. A 
faint blush died away from her pale cheek as she put her 
hand in his and looked up at him timidly. 

“ It ’s an errand to you brought me, Dinah,” said Adam, 
apparently unconscious that he was holding her hand all the 
while ; mother 's a bit ailing, and she ’s set her heart on 
your coming to stay the night with her, if you ’ll be so kind. 
I told her I ’d call and ask you as I came from the village. 
She overworks herself, and I can’t persuade her to have a 
little girl t’ help her. I don’t know what ’s to be done.” 

Adam released Dinah’s hand as he ceased speaking, and 
was expecting an answer ; but before she had opened her 
lips Mrs. Poyser said, — 

“ Look there now ! I told you there was folks enow t’ 
help i’ this parish, wi’out going further off. There ’s Mrs. 
Bede getting as old and cas’alty as can be, and she won’t let 
anybody but you go a-nigh her hardly. The folks at Snow- 
field have learnt by this time to do better wi’out you nor she 
can. 

“ I ’ll put my bonnet on and set off directly, if you don’t 
want anything done first, aunt,” said Dinah, folding up her 
work. 

“ Yes, I do want something done. I want you t’ have your 
tea, child ; it ’s all ready ; and you ’ll have a cup, Adam, if y’ 
arena in too big a hurry.” 

“Yes, I’ll have a cup, please; and then I’ll walk with 
81 481 


ADAM BEDE 


Dinah. I 'm going straight home, for I Ve got a lot o’ tim- 
ber valuations to write out.” 

“ Why, Adam, lad, are you here ? ” said Mr. Poyser, enter- 
ing warm and coatless, with the two black-eyed boys be- 
hind him, still looking as much like him as two small ele- 
phants are like a large one. “ How is it we ’ve got sight o’ 
you so long before foddering time ? ” 

“ I came on an errand for mother,” said Adam. She ’s 
got a touch of her old complaint, and she wants Dinah to go 
and stay with her a bit.” 

“ Well, we ’ll spare her for your mother a little while,” said 
Mr. Poyser. “ But we wonna spare her for anybody else, 
on’y her husband.” 

“ Husband ! ” said Marty, who was at the most prosaic and 
literal period of the boyish mind. Why, Dinah has n’t got 
a husband.” 

“Spare her?” said Mrs. Poyser, placing a seed-cake on 
the table, and then seating herself to pour out the tea. “ But 
we must spare her, it seems, and not for a husband neither, 
but for her own megrims. Tommy, what are you doing to 
your little sister’s doll? Making the child naughty, when 
she ’d be good if you ’d let her. You shanna have a morsel 
o’ cake if you behave so.” 

Tommy, with true brotherly sympathy, was amusing him- 
self by turning Dolly’s skirt over her bald head, and exhibit- 
ing her truncated body to the general scorn, — an indignity 
which cut Totty to the heart. 

“ What do you think Dinah ’s been a-telling me since din- 
ner-time?” Mrs. Poyser continued, looking at her husband. 

“ Eh ! I ’m a poor un at guessing,” said Mr. Poyser. 

“V/hy, she means to go back to Snowfield again, and 
work i’ the mill, and starve herself, as she used to do, like 
a creatur as has got no friends.” 

Mr. Poyser did not readily find words to express his un- 
pleasant astonishment; he only looked from his wife to 
Dinah, who had now seated herself beside Totty, as a bul- 
wark against brotherly playfulness, and was busying herself 
with the children’s tea. If he had been given to making gen- 
eral reflections, it would have occurred to him that there was 
certainly a change come over Dinah, for she never used to 

482 


AT THE HALL FARM 


change colour ; but, as it was, he merely observed that her 
face was flushed at that moment. Mr. Poyser thought she 
looked the prettier for it. It was a flush no deeper than the 
petal of a monthly rose. Perhaps it came because her uncle 
was looking at her so fixedly ; but there is no knowing, for 
just then Adam was saying with quiet surprise, — 

“ Why, I hoped Dinah was settled among us for life. I 
thought she ’d given up the notion o’ going back to her old 
country.” 

“ Thought ! yes,” said Mrs. Poyser ; and so would any- 
body else ha’ thought, as had got their right end up’ards. 
But I suppose you must be a Methodist to know what a 
Methodist ’ull do. It ’s ill guessing what the bats are flying 
after.” 

“ Why, what have we done to you, Dinah, as you must go 
away from us ? ” said Mr. Poyser, still pausing over his tea- 
cup. “ It ’s like breaking your word, welly ; for your aunt 
never had no thought but you ’d make this your home.” 

Nay, uncle,” said Dinah, trying to be quite calm. 

When I first came, I said it was only for a time, as long 
as I could be of any comfort to my aunt.” 

“ Well, an’ who said you ’d ever left off being a comfort 
to me ? ” said Mrs. Poyser. “ If you didna mean to stay wi’ 
me, you ’d better never ha’ come. Them as ha’ never had a 
cushion don’t miss it.” 

Nay, nay,” said Mr. Poyser, who objected to exag- 
gerated views. “ Thee mustna say so ; we should ha’ been 
ill off wi’out her. Lady Day was a twelvemont’ : we mun be 
thankful for that, whether she stays or no. But I canna 
think what she mun leave a good home for, to go back int’ 
a country where the land, most on ’t, isna worth ten shil- 
lings an acre, rent and profits.” 

Why, that ’s just the reason she wants to go, as fur as she 
can give a reason,” said Mrs. Poyser. “ She says this coun- 
try ’s too comfortable, an‘’ there ’s too much t’ eat, .an’ folks 
arena miserable enough. And she’s going next week: I 
canna turn her, say what I will. It ’s allays the way wi’ them 
meek-faced people ; you may ’s well pelt a bag o feathers as 
talk to ’em. But I say it isna religion, to be so obstinate, — 
is it now, Adam ? ” 


483 


ADAM BEDE 


Adam saw that Dinah was more disturbed than he had 
ever seen her by any matter relating to herself and, anxious 
to relieve her, if possible, he said, looking at her affec- 
tionately, — 

Nay, I can’t find fault with anything Dinah does. I be- 
lieve her thoughts are better than our guesses, let ’em be 
what they may. I should ha’ been thankful for her to stay 
among us ; but if she thinks well to go, I would n’t cross 
her, or make it hard to her by objecting. We owe her some- 
thing different to that.” 

As it often happens, the words intended to relieve her 
were just too much for Dinah’s susceptible feelings at this 
moment. The tears came into the gray eyes too fast to be 
hidden ; and she got up hurriedly, meaning it to be under- 
stood that she was going to put on her bonnet. 

“Mother, what’s Dinah crying for?” said Totty. “She 
is n’t a naughty dell.” 

“ Thee ’st gone a bit too fur,” said Mr. Poyser. “We ’ve 
no right t’ interfere with her doing as she likes. An’ thee 
’dst be as angry as could be wi’ me, if I said a word against 
anything she did.” 

“ Because you ’d very like be finding fault wi’out reason,” 
said Mrs. Poyser. “ But there ’s reason i’ what I say, else I 
shouldna say it. It ’s easy talking for them as can’t love her 
so well as her own aunt does. An’ me got so used to her! 
I shall feel as uneasy as a new sheared sheep when she ’s 
gone from me. An’ to think of her leaving a parish where 
she ’s so looked on. There ’s Mr. Irwine makes as much of 
her as if she was a lady, for all her being a Methodist, an’ 
wi’ that maggot o’ preaching in her head, — God forgi’e me 
if I ’m i’ the wrong to call it so.” 

“ Ay,” said Mr. Poyser, looking jocose ; “ but thee dostna 
tell Adam what he said to thee about it one day. The missis 
was saying, Adam, as the preaching was the only fault to be 
found wi’ Dinah ; and Mr. Irwine says : ‘ But you must n’t 
find fault with her for that, Mrs. Poyser ; you forget she ’s got 
no husband to preach to. I ’ll answer for it, you give Poyser 
many a good sermon.’ The parson had thee there,” Mr. 
Poyser added, laughing unctuously. “ I told Bartle Massey 
on it, an’ he laughed too.” 


484 


AT THE HALL FARM 


“ Yes, it 's a small jo'ke sets men laughing when they sit 
a-staring at one another with a pipe i’ their mouths,’' said 
Mrs. Poyser. Give Bartle Massey his way, and he ’d have 
all the sharpness to himself. If the chaff-cutter had the 
making of us, we should all be straw, I reckon. Totty, m)^ 
chicken, go upstairs to Cousin Dinah, and see what she ’s 
doing, and give her a pretty kiss.” 

This errand was devised for Totty as a means of checking 
certain threatening symptoms about the corners of the 
mouth ; for Tommy, no longer expectant of cake, was lift- 
ing up his eyelids with his forefingers, and turning his eye- 
balls towards Totty, in a way that she felt to be disagreeably 
personal. 

“ You ’re rare and busy now, — eh, Adam ?” said Mr. Poy- 
ser. '' Burge ’s getting so bad wi’ his asthmy, it ’s well if 
he ’ll ever do much riding about again.” 

Yes, we ’ve got a pretty bit o’ building on hand now,” 
said Adam, ‘‘ what with the repairs on th’ estate, and the new 
houses at Treddles’on.” 

“ I ’ll bet a penny that new house Burge is building on his 
own bit o’ land is for him and Mary to go to,” said Mr. 
Poyser. He ’ll be for laying by business soon, I ’ll warrant, 
and be wanting you to take to it all, and pay him so much 
by th’ ’ear. We shall see you living on th’ hill before an- 
other twelvemont’ ’s over.” 

“ Well,” said Adam, I should like t’ have the business 
in my own hands. It isn’t as I mind much about getting 
any more money, — we ’ve enough and to spare now, with 
only our two selves and mother; but I should like t’ have 
my own way about things. I could try plans then as I can’t 
do now.” 

“ You get on pretty well wi’ the new steward, I reckon? ” 
said Mr. Poyser. 

“Yes, yes; he’s a sensible man enough: understands 
farming, — he ’s carrying on the draining, and all that, capi- 
tal. You must go some day towards the Stonyshire side, 
and see what alterations they ’re making. But he ’s got no 
notion about buildings: you can so seldom get hold of a 
man as can turn his brains to more nor one thing ; it ’s just 
as if they wore blinkers like th’ horses, and could see nothing 

485 


ADAM BEDE 


o’ one side of ’em. Now, there ’s Mr. Irwine has got no- 
tions o’ building more nor most architects ; for as for th’ 
architects^ they set up to be fine fellows, but the most of ’em 
don’t know where to set a chimney so as it sha’n’t be quarrel- 
ling with a door. My notion is, a practical builder, that ’s 
got a bit o’ taste, makes the best architect for common 
things ; and I ’ve ten times the pleasure i’ seeing after the 
work when 1 ’ve made the plan myself.” 

Mr. Poyser listened with an admiring interest to Adam’s 
discourse on building ; but perhaps it suggested to him that 
the building of his corn-rick had been proceeding a little too 
long without the control of the master’s eye ; for when Adam 
had done speaking, he got up and said, — 

Well, lad, I ’ll bid you good-by now, for I ’m off to the 
rick-yard again.” 

Adam rose too ; for he saw Dinah entering with her bon- 
net on, and a little basket in her hand, preceded by Totty. 

“ You ’re ready, I see, Dinah,” Adam said; so we ’ll set 
off, for the sooner I ’m at home the better.” 

“ Mother,” said Totty, with her treble pipe, “ Dinah was 
saying her prayers and crying ever so.” 

“ Hush, hush ! ” said the mother ; “ little gells must n’l 
chatter.” 

Whereupon the father, shaking with silent laughter, set 
Totty on the white deal table, and desired her to kiss him. 
Mr. and Mrs. Poyser, you perceive, had no correct princi- 
ples of education. 

“ Come back to-morrow if Mrs. Bede does n’t want you, 
Dinah,” said Mrs. Poyser ; “ but you can stay, you know, 
if she ’s ill.” 

So, when the good-byes had been said, Dinah and Adam 
left the Hall Farm together. 


486 


IN THE COTTAGE 


CHAPTER L. 


IN THE COTTAGE 


DAM did not ask Dinah to take his arm when they 



got out into the lane. He had never yet done so, 
often as they had walked together ; for he had observed that 
she never walked arm-in-arm with Seth, and he thought, per- 
haps, that kind of support was not agreeable to her. So they 
walked apart, though side by side, and the close poke of her 
little black bonnet hid her face from him. 

“ You can’t be happy, then, to make the Hall Farm your 
home, Dinah?” Adam said, with the quiet interest of a 
brother, who has no anxiety for himself in the matter. “ It ’s 
a pity, seeing they ’re so fond of you.” 

You know, Adam, my heart is as their heart, so far as 
love for them and care for their welfare goes ; but they are 
in no present need, their sorrows are healed, and I feel that 1 
am called back to my old work, in which I found a blessing 
that I have missed of late in the midst of too abundant 
worldly good. I know it is a vain thought to flee from the 
work that God appoints us, for the sake of finding a greater 
blessing to our own souls, as if we could choose for our- 
selves where we shall find the fulness of the Divine Presence, 
instead of seeking it where alone it is to be found, in loving 
obedience. But now, I believe, I have a clear showing that 
my work lies elsewhere, — at least for a time. In the years 
to come, if my aunt’s health should fail, or she should other- 
wise need me, I shall return.” 

“ You know best, Dinah,” said Adam. ‘‘ I don’t believe 
you ’d go against the wishes of them that love you and are 
akin to you without a good and sufficient reason in your 
own conscience. I ’ve no right to say anything about my 
being sorry, — you know well enough what cause I have 
to put you above every other friend I ’ve got ; and if it had 
been ordered so that you could ha’ been my sister, and lived 
with us all our lives, I should ha’ counted it the greatest 
blessing as could happen to us now; but Seth tells me 
there ’s no hope o’ that, — your feelings are different ; and 
perhaps I ’m taking too much upon me to speak about it.” 


487 


ADAM BEDE 


Dinah made no answer, and they walked on in silence for 
some yards, till they came to the stone stile ; where, as Adam 
had passed through first, and turned round to give her his 
hand while she mounted the unusually high step, she could 
not prevent him from seeing her face. It struck him with 
surprise ; for the gray eyes, usually so mild and grave, had 
the bright uneasy glance which accompanies suppressed agi- 
tation, and the slight flush in her cheeks, with which she had 
come downstairs, was heightened to a deep rose colour. 
She looked as if she were onl^y sister to Dinah. Adam was 
silent with surprise and conjecture for some moments, and 
then he said, — 

“ I hope I Ve not hurt or displeased you by what I Ve said, 
Dinah ; perhaps I was making too free. I Ve no wish dif- 
ferent from what you see to be best ; and I ’m satisfied for 
you to live thirty mile off, if you think it right. I shall think 
of you just as much as I do now ; for you ’re bound up with 
what I can no more help remembering than I can help my 
heart beating.” 

Poor Adam ! Thus do men blunder. Dinah made no an- 
swer ; but she presently said, — 

Have you heard any news from that poor young man 
since we last spoke of him ? ” 

Dinah always called Arthur so; she had never lost the 
image of him as she had seen him in the prison. 

“ Yes,” said Adam. “ Mr. Irwine read me part of a letter 
from him yesterday. It ’s pretty certain, they say, that 
there ’ll be a peace soon, though nobody believes it ’ll last 
long ; but he says he does n’t mean to come home. He ’s 
no heart for it yet ; and it ’s better for others that he should 
keep aw^ay. Mr. Irwine thinks he ’s in the right not to come. 
It ’s a sorrowful letter. He asks about you and the Poysers, 
as he always does. There ’s one thing in the letter cut me a 
good deal: ' You can’t think what an old fellow I feel,’ he 
says ; ^ I make no schemes now. I ’m the best when I ’ve a 
good day’s march or fighting before me.’ ” 

“ He ’s of a rash, warm-hearted nature, like Esau, for 
whom I have always felt great pity,” said Dinah. That 
meeting between the brothers, where Esau is so loving and 
generous, and Jacob so timid and distrustful, notwithstand- 

488 


IN THE COTTAGE 


ing his sense of the Divine favour, has always touched me 
greatly. Truly, I have been tempted sometimes to say that 
Jacob was of a mean spirit. But that is our trial, — we must 
learn to see the good in the midst of much that is unlovely.” 

Ah,” said Adam, “ I like to read about Moses best, in th’ 
Old Testament. He carried a hard business well through, 
and died when other folks were going to reap the fruits ; a 
man must have courage to look at his life so, and think 
what ’ll come of it after he ’s dead and gone. A good solid 
bid o’ work lasts ; if it ’s only laying a floor down, some- 
body ’s the better for it being done well, besides the man as 
does it.” 

They were both glad to talk of subjects that were not per- 
sonal, and in this way they went on till they passed the bridge 
across the Willow Brook, when Adam turned round and 
said, — 

Ah, here ’s Seth. I thought he ’d be home soon. Does 
he know of your going, Dinah ? ” 

‘‘ Yes, I told him last Sabbath.” 

Adam remembered now that Seth had come home much 
depressed on Sunday evening, — a circumstance which had 
been very unusual with him of late, for the happiness he had 
in seeing Dinah every week seemed long to have outweighed 
the pain of knowing she would never marry him. This even- 
ing he had his habitual air of dreamy, benignant content- 
ment, until he came quite close to Dinah, and saw the traces 
of tears on her delicate eyelids and eyelashes. He gave one 
rapid glance at his brother; but Adam was evidently quite 
outside the current of emotion that had shaken Dinah : he 
wore his every-day look of unexpectant calm. Seth tried not 
to let Dinah see that he had noticed her face, and only 
said, — 

“ I ’m thankful you ’re come, Dinah, for mother ’s been 
hungering after the sight of you all day. She began to talk 
of you the first thing in the morning.” 

When they entered the cottage, Lisbeth was seated in her 
arm-chair, too tired with setting out the evening meal, a task 
she always performed a long time beforehand, to go and 
meet them at the door as usual, when she heard the approach- 
ing footsteps. 


489 


ADAM BEDE 


Coom, child, thee ’t coom at last,’' she said, when Dinah 
went towards her. “ What dost mane by lavin’ me a week, 
an’ ne’er coomin’ a-nigh me ? ” 

Dear friend,” said Dinah, taking her hand, you ’re not 
well. If I ’d known it sooner, I ’d have come.” 

An’ how ’s thee t’ know if thee dostna coom ? Th’ lads 
on’y know what I tell ’em ; as long as ye can stir hand and 
foot the men think ye ’re hearty. But I ’m none so bad, on’y 
a bit of a cold sets me achin’. An’ th’ lads tease me so t’ 
ha’ somebody wi’ me t’ do the work, — they make me ache 
worse wi’ talkin’. If thee ’dst come to stay wi’ me, they ’d 
let me alone. The Poysers canna want thee so bad as I do. 
But take thy bonnet off, an’ let me look at thee.” 

Dinah was moving away ; but Lisbeth held her fast, while 
she was taking off her bonnet, and looked at her face, as one 
looks into a newly gathered snow-drop, to renew the old 
impressions of purity and gentleness. 

“ What ’s the matter wi’ thee ? ” said Lisbeth, in astonish- 
ment ; “ thee ’st been a-cryin’.” 

“ It ’s only a grief that ’ll pass away,” said Dinah, who did 
not wish just now to call forth Lisbeth’s remonstances by 
disclosing her intention to leave Hayslope. ‘‘ You shall 
know about it shortly, — we ’ll talk of it to-night. I shall 
stay with you to-night.” 

Lisbeth was pacified by this prospect; and she had the 
whole evening to talk with Dinah alone, — for there was a 
new room in the cottage, you remember, built nearly two 
years ago, in the expectation of a new inmate; and here 
Adam always sat when he had writing to do, or plans to 
make. Seth sat there too this evening, for he knew his 
mother would like to have Dinah all to herself. 

There were two pretty pictures on the two sides of the wall 
in the cottage. On one side there was the broad-shouldered, 
large-featured, hardy old woman, in her blue jacket and buff 
kerchief, with her dim-eyed anxious looks turned continually 
on the lily face and the slight form in the black dress that 
were either moving lightly about in helpful activity, or seated 
close by the old woman’s arm-chair, holding her withered 
hand, with eyes lifted up towards her to speak a language 
which Lisbeth understood far better than the Bible or the 


490 


IN THE COTTAGE 


hymn-book. She would scarcely listen to reading at all to- 
night. “ Nay, nay, shut the book,’' she said. “We mun 
talk. I want t’ know what thee was cryin’ about. Hast got 
troubles o’ thy own, like other folks ? ” 

On the other side of the wall there were the two brothers, 
so like each other in the midst of their unlikeness, — Adam, 
with knit brows, shaggy hair, and dark vigorous colour, ab- 
sorbed in his “ figuring ; ” Seth, with large rugged features, 
the close copy of his brother’s, but with thin wavy brown 
hair and blue dreamy eyes, as often as not looking vaguely 
out of the window instead of at his book, although it was a 
newly bought book, — Wesley’s abridgment of Madame 
Guyon’s life, which was full of wonder and interest for him. 
Seth had said to Adam, “ Can I help thee with anything in 
here to-night? I don’t want to make a noise in the shop.” 

“ No, lad,” Adam answered, “ there ’s nothing but what I 
must do myself. Thee ’st got thy new book to read.” 

And often, when Seth was quite unconscious, Adam, as he 
paused after drawing a line with his ruler, looked at his 
brother with a kind smile dawning in his eyes. He knew “ th’ 
lad liked to sit full o’ thoughts he could give no account of ; 
they ’d never come t’ anything, but they made him happy ; ” 
and in the last year or so, Adam had been getting more and 
more indulgent to Seth. It was part of that growing tender- 
ness which came from the sorrow at work within him. 

For Adam, though you see him quite master of himself, 
working hard and delighting in his work after his inborn, in- 
alienable nature, had not outlived his sorrow, — had not felt 
it slip from him as a temporary burthen, and leave him the 
same man again. Do any of us? God forbid. It would be 
a poor result of all our anguish and our wrestling, if we won 
nothing but our old selves at the end of it, — if w-e could re- 
turn to the same blind loves, the same self-confident blame, 
the same light thoughts of human suffering, the same frivo- 
lous gossip over blighted human lives, the same feeble sense 
of that Unknown towards which we have sent forth irre- 
pressible cries in our loneliness. Let us rather be thankful 
that our sorrow lives in us as an indestructible force, only 
changing its form, as forces do, and passing from pain into 
sympathy, — the one poor word which includes all our best 

491 


ADAM BEDE 


insight and our best love. Not that this transformation of 
pain into sympathy had completely taken place in Adam 
yet : there was still a great remnant of pain, and this he felt 
would subsist as long as her pain was not a memory, but 
an existing thing, which he must think of as renewed with 
the light of every new morning. But we get accustomed to 
mental as well as bodily pain, without, for all that, losing our 
sensibility to it : it becomes a habit of our lives, and we 
cease to imagine a condition of perfect ease as possible for 
us. Desire is chastened into submission ; and we are con- 
tented with our day when we have been able to bear our 
grief in silence, and act as if we were not suffering. For it is 
at such periods that the sense of our lives having visible and 
invisible relations beyond any of which either our present or 
prospective self is the centre, grows like a muscle that we 
are obliged to lean on and exert. 

That was Adam’s state of mind in this second autumn of 
his sorrow. His work, as you know, had always been part 
of his religion, and from very early days he saw clearly that 
good carpentry was God’s will, — was that form of God’s will 
that most immediately concerned him ; but now there was 
no margin of dreams for him beyond this daylight reality, no 
holiday-time in the working-day world ; no moment in the 
distance when Duty would take off her iron glove and breast- 
plate, and clasp him gently into rest. He conceived no 
picture of the future but one made up of hard-working days 
such as he lived through, with growing contentment and in- 
tensity of interest, every fresh week ; love, he thought, could 
never be anything to him but a living memory, — a limb 
lopped off, but not gone from consciousness. He did not 
know that the power of loving was all the while gaining new 
force within him ; that the new sensibilities bought by a deep 
experience were so many new fibres by which it was possi- 
ble, nay, necessary to him, that his nature should intertwine 
with another. Yet he was aware that common affection 
and friendship were more precious to him than they used 
to be, — that he clung more to his mother and Seth, and had 
an unspeakable satisfaction in the sight or imagination of 
any small addition to their happiness. The Poysers, too, — 
hardly three or four days passed but he felt the need of see- 


492 


IN THE COTTAGE 


ing them, and interchanging words and looks of friendliness 
with them : he would have felt this, probably, even if Dinah 
had not been with them ; but he had only said the simplest 
truth in telling Dinah that he put her above all other friends 
in the world. Could anything be more natural ? For in the 
darkest moments of memory the thought of her always came 
as the first ray of returning comfort ; the early days of gloom 
at the Hall Farm had been gradually turned into soft moon- 
light by her presence ; and in the cottage, too, — for she had 
come at every spare moment to soothe and cheer poor Lis- 
beth, who had been stricken with a fear that subdued even 
her querulousness, at the sight of her darling Adam’s grief- 
worn face. He had become used to watching her light, quiet 
movements, her pretty, loving ways to the children, when he 
went to the Hall Farm ; to listen for her voice as for a re- 
current music; to think everything she said and did was 
just right, and could not have been better. In spite of his 
wisdom, he could not find fault with her for her over-indul- 
gence of the children, who had managed to convert Dinah 
the preacher, before whom a circle of rough men had often 
trembled a little, into a convenient household slave ; though 
Dinah herself was rather ashamed of this weakness, and had 
some inward conflict as to her departure from the precepts of 
Solomon. Yes, there was one thing that might have been 
better; she might have loved Seth and consented to marry 
him. He felt a little vexed, for his brother’s sake; and he 
could not help thinking regretfully how Dinah, as Seth’s 
wife, would have made their home as happy as it could be 
for them all, — how she was the one being that would have 
soothed their mother’s last days into peacefulness and rest. 

It ’s w^onderful she does n’t love th’ lad,” Adam had said 
sometimes to himself ; “ for anybody ’ud think he was just 
cut out for her. But her heart ’s so taken up with other 
things. She ’s one o’ those women that feel no drawing to- 
wards having a husband and children o’ their own. She 
thinks she should be filled up with her own life then; and 
she ’s been used so to living in other folks’s cares, she can’t 
bear the thought of her heart being shut up from ’em. I see 
how it is, well enough. She ’s cut out o’ different stuff from 
most women, — I saw that long ago. She ’s never easy but 


493 


ADAM BEDE 


when she ’s helping somebody, and marriage 'ud interfere 
with her ways, — that 's true. I ’ve no right, to be contriv- 
ing and thinking it ’ud be better if she M have Seth, as if I 
was wiser than she is, — or than God either, for he made her 
what she is, and that 's one o’ the greatest blessings I ’ve 
ever had from his hands, and others besides me.” 

This self-reproof had recurred strongly to Adam’s mind, 
when he gathered from Dinah’s face that he had wounded 
her by referring to his wish that she had accepted Seth, and 
so he had endeavoured to put into the strongest words his 
confidence in her decision as right, — his resignation even to 
her going away from them, and ceasing to make part of 
their life otherwise than by living in their thoughts, if that 
separation w^ere chosen by herself. He felt sure she knew 
quite well enough how much he cared to see her continually, 
— to talk to her with the silent consciousness of a mutual 
great remembrance. It was not possible she should hear 
anything but self-renouncing affection and respect in his 
assurance that he was contented for her to go away; and 
yet there remained an uneasy feeling in his mind that he had 
not said quite the right thing, — that somehow Dinah had 
not understood him. 

Dinah must have risen a little before the sun the next 
morning, for she was downstairs about five o’clock. So was 
Seth ; for, through Lisbeth’s obstinate refusal to have any 
woman-helper in the house, he had learned to make himself, 
as Adam said, “ very handy in the housework,” that he 
might save his mother from too great weariness; on which 
ground I hope you will not think him unmanly, any more 
than you can have thought the gallant Colonel Bath un- 
manly when he made the gruel for his invalid sister. Adam, 
who had sat up late at his writing, was still asleep, and was 
not likely, Seth said, to be down till breakfast-time. Often 
as Dinah had visited Lisbeth during the last eighteen 
months, she had never slept in the cottage since that night 
after Thias’s death, when, you remember, Lisbeth praised her 
deft movements, and even gave a modified approval to her 
porridge. But in that long interval Dinah had made great 
advances in household cleverness ; and this morning, since 
Seth was there to help, she was bent on bringing everything 

494 


IN THE COTTAGE 


to a pitch of cleanliness and order that would have satisfied 
her aunt Poyser. The cottage was far from that standard 
at present, for Lisbeth’s rheumatism had forced her to give 
up her old habits of dilettante scouring and polishing. When 
the kitchen was to her mind, Dinah went into the new room, 
where Adam had been writing the night before, to see what 
sweeping and dusting were needed there. She opened the 
window and let in the fresh morning air, and the smell of 
the- sweet-brier, and the bright low-slanting rays of the early 
sun, which made a glory about her pale face and pale auburn 
hair as she held the long brush, and swept, singing to her- 
self in a very low tone, like a sweet summer murmur that 
you have to listen for very closely, one of Charles Wesley’s 
hymns, — 

“ Eternal Beam of Light Divine, 

Fountain of unexhausted love, 

In whom the Father’s glories shine, 

Through earth beneath and heaven above; 

Jesus! the weary wanderer’s rest. 

Give me thy easy yoke to bear; 

With steadfast patience arm my breast. 

With spotless love and holy fear. 

“ Speak to my warring passions, ‘ Peace ! * 

Say to my trembling heart, ‘ Be still! ’ 

Thy power my strength and fortress is. 

For all things serve thy sovereign will.” 

She laid by the brush, and took up the duster ; and if you 
had ever lived in Mrs. Poyser’s household, you would know 
how the duster behaved in Dinah’s hand, — how .it went into 
every small corner, and on every ledge in and out of sight, 
— how it went again and again round every bar of the chairs, 
and every leg, and under and over everything that lay on 
the table, till it came to Adam’s papers and rulers, and the 
open desk near them. Dinah dusted up to the very edge of 
these, and then hesitated, looking at them with a longing but 
timid eye. It was painful to see how much dust there was 
among them. As she was looking in this way, she heard 
Seth’s step just outside the open door, towards which her 
back was turned and said, raising her clear treble, — 

495 


ADAM BEDE 


“ Seth, is your brother wrathful when his papers are 
stirred?'' 

Yes, very, when they are not put back in the right 
places," said a deep, strong voice, not Seth's. 

It was as if Dinah had put her hands unawares on a vibrat- 
ing chord ; she was shaken with an intense thrill, and for 
the instant felt nothing else ; then she knew her cheeks were 
glowing, and dared not look round, but stood still, distressed 
because she could not say good-morning in a friendly way. 
Adam, finding that she did not look round so as to see the 
smile on his face, was afraid she had thought him serious 
about his wrathfulness, and went up to her, so that she was 
obliged to look at him. 

“ What ! you think I 'm a cross fellow at home, Dinah ? " 
he said smilingly. 

“ Nay," said Dinah, looking up with timid eyes, not so. 
But you might be put about by finding things meddled with ; 
and even the man Moses, the meekest of men, was wrathful 
sometimes." 

“ Come, then," said Adam, looking at her affectionately, 
“ I 'll help you move the things, and put 'em back again, and 
then they can't get wrong. You 're getting to be your aunt's 
own niece, I see, for particularness." 

They began their little task together ; but Dinah had not 
recovered herself sufficiently to think of any remark, and 
Adam looked at her uneasily. Dinah, he thought, had 
seemed to disapprove him somehow lately ; she had not been 
so kind and open to him as she used to be. He wanted her to 
look at him, and be as pleased as he was himself with doing 
this bit of playful work. But Dinah did not look at him, — 
it was easy for her to avoid looking at the tall man ; and 
when at last there was no more dusting to be done, and no 
further excuse for him to linger near her, he could bear it 
no longer, and said in rather a pleading tone, — 

“ Dinah, you 're not displeased with me for anything, are 
you ? I 've not said or done anything to make you think ill 
of me? " 

The question surprised her, and relieved her by giving a 
new course to her feeling. She looked up at him now, quite 
earnestly, almost with the tears coming, and said, — 

496 


IN THE COTTAGE 


Oh, no, Adam ! how could you think so ? ” 

'' I could n’t bear you not to feel as much a friend to me 
as I do to you,” said Adam. And you don’t know the 
value I set on the very thought of you, Dinah. That was 
whiat I meant yesterday, when I said I ’d be content for you 
to go, if you thought right. I meant, the thought of you 
was worth so much to me, I should feel I ought to be 
thankful, and not grumble, if you see right to go away. You 
know I do mind parting with you, Dinah ? ” 

Yes, dear friend,” said Dinah, trembling, but trying to 
speak calmly, I know you have a brother’s heart towards 
me, and we shall often be with one another in spirit ; but at 
this season I am in heaviness through manifold temptations : 
you must not mark me. I feel called to leave my kindred for 
a while ; but it is a trial : the flesh is weak.” 

Adam saw that it pained her to be o-bliged to answer. 

I hurt you by talking about it, Dinah,” he said ; I ’ll 
say no more. Let ’s see if Seth ’s ready with breakfast now.” 

That is a simple scene, reader. But it is almost certain 
that you, too, have been in love, — perhaps, even, more than 
once, though you may not choose to say so to all your fem- 
inine friends. If so, you will no more think the slight words, 
the timid looks, the tremulous touches, by which two hu- 
man souls approach each other gradually, like two little 
quivering rain-streams, before they mingle into one, — you 
will no more think these things trivial than you will think 
the first-detected signs of coming spring trivial, though they 
be but a faint, indescribable something in the air and in the 
song of the birds, and the tiniest perceptible budding on the 
hedgerow branches. Those slight words and looks and 
touches are part of the soul’s language; and the finest lan- 
guage, I believe, is chiefly made up of unimposing words, 
such as '' light,” “ sound,” “ stars,” “ music,” — words really 
not worth looking at or hearing in themselves, any more 
than chips ” or sawdust : ” it is only that they happen to 
be the . signs of something unspeakably great and beautiful. 
I am of opinion that love is a great and beautiful thing too ; 
and if yon agree with me, the smallest signs of it will not be 
chips and sawdust to you : they will rather be like those lit- 

497 


32 


ADAM BEDE 


.le' words, light ” and music, stirring the long-winding 
fibres of your memory, and enriching your present with your 
most precious past. 


CHAPTER LI. 


SUNDAY MORNING 


ISBETH'S touch of rheumatism could not be made to 



JL^ appear serious enough to detain Dinah another night 
from the Hall Farm, now she had made up her mind to leave 
her aunt so soon; and at evening the friends must part. 
“ For a long while,'' Dinah had said; for she had told Lis- 
beth of her resolve. 

“ Then it 'll be for all my life, an' I shall ne'er see thee 
again," said Lisbeth. “ Long while ! I 'n got no long while 
t' live. An' I shall be took bad an' die, an' thee canst ne'er 
come a-nigh me, an’ I shall die a-longing for thee.” 

That had been the keynote of her wailing talk all day ; for 
Adam was not in the house, and so she put no restraint on 
her complaining. She had tried poor Dinah by returning 
again and again to the question why she must go away, and 
refusing to accept reasons which seemed to her nothing but 
whim and contrairiness ; " and still more, by regretting that 
she “ couldna ha’ one o' the lads," and be her daughter. 

“Thee couldstna put up wi’ Seth," she said ; “he isna diver 
enough for thee, happen ; but he 'd ha’ been very good t' 
thee, — he 's as handy as can be at doin’ things for me when 
I 'm bad ; an’ he 's as fond o' the Bible an' chappellin' as 
thee art thysen. But happen, thee 'dst like a husband better 
as isna just the cut o' thysen ; the runnin’ brook isna athirst 
for th’ rain. Adam 'ud ha' done for thee, — I know he 
would ; an' he might come t' like thee well enough, if thee 'dst 
stop. But he 's as stubborn as th' iron bar, — there's no 
bending him no way but 's own. But he 'd be a fine husband 
for anybody, be they who they will, so looked on an' so diver 
as he is. And he 'd be rare an' lovin' ; it does me good on’y 
a look o' the lad's eyes, when he means kind tow'rt me." 

Dinah tried to escape from Lisbeth's closest looks and 


498 


SUNDAY MORNING 


questions by finding little tasks of housework, that kept her 
moving about ; and as soon as Seth came home in the even- 
ing she put on her bonnet to go. It touched Dinah keenly 
to say the last good-by, and still more to look round on her 
way across the fields, and see the old woman still standing 
at the door, gazing after her till she must have been the faint- 
est speck in the dim aged eyes. “ The God of love and 
peace be with them,” Dinah prayed, as she looked back from 
the last stile. Make them glad according to the days 
wherein thou hast afflicted them, and the years wherein they 
have seen evil. It is thy will that I should part from them ; 
let me have no will but thine.” 

Lisbeth turned into the house at last, and sat down in the 
workshop near Seth, who was busying himself there with 
fitting some bits of turned wood he had brought from the 
village, into a small work-box which he meant to give to 
Dinah before she went away. 

Thee ’t see her again o’ Sunday afore she goes,” were her 
first words. “ If thee wast good for anything, thee Mst make 
her come in again o’ Sunday night wi’ thee, and see me 
once more.” 

Nay, mother,” said Seth, “ Dinah ’ud be sure to come 
again if she saw right to come. I should have no need to 
persuade her. She only thinks it ’ud be troubling thee for 
nought, just to come in to say good-by over again.” 

She ’d ne’er go away, I know, if Adam ’ud be fond on 
her an’ marry her ; but everything ’s so contrairy,” said Lis- 
beth, with a burst of vexation. 

Seth paused a moment, and looked up with a slight blush 
at his mother’s face. “ What ! has she said anything o’ that 
sort to thee, mother? ” he said in a lower tone. 

‘‘Said? Nay, she’ll say nothin’. It’s on’y the men as 
have to wait till folks say things afore they find ’em out.” 

“ Well, but what makes thee think so, mother ? What ’s 
put it into thy head ? ” 

It ’s no matter what ’s put it into my head ; my head ’s 
none so hollow as it must get in, an’ nought to put it there. 
I know she ’s fond on him, as I know th’ wind ’s cornin’ in at 
the door, an’ that ’s anoof. An’ he might be willin’ to marry 

499 


ADAM BEDE 


her if he know’d she ’s fond on him, but he ’ll ne’er think 
on ’t if somebody doesna put it into ’s head.” 

His mother’s suggestion about Dinah’s feeling towards 
Adam was not quite a new thought to Seth; but her last 
words alarmed him, lest she should herself undertake to 
open Adam’s eyes. He was not sure about Dinah’s feeling, 
and he thought he was sure about Adam’s. 

“ Nay, mother, nay,” he said earnestly, “ thee mustna 
think o’ speaking o’ such things to Adam. Thee ’st no right 
to say what Dinah’s feelings are if she hasna told thee ; and 
it ’ud do nothing but mischief to say such things to Adam. 
He feels very grateful and affectionate toward Dinah, but 
he ’s no thoughts towards her that ’ud incline him to make 
her his wife ; and I don’t believe Dinah ’ud marry him either. 
I don’t think she ’ll marry at all.” 

“ Eh,” said Lisbeth, impatiently. “ Thee think’st so ’cause 
she wouldna ha’ thee. She ’ll ne’er marry thee ; thee mightst 
as well like her t’ ha’ thy brother.” 

Seth was hurt. Mother,” he said, in a remonstrating 
tone, “ don’t think that of me. I should be as thankful t’ 
have her for a sister as thee would st t’ have her for a daugh- 
ter. I ’ve no more thoughts about myself in that thing, and 
I shall take it hard if ever thee say’st it again.” 

‘‘ Well, well, then thee shouldstna cross me wi’ sayin’ 
things arena as I say they are.” 

“ But, mother,” said Seth, “ thee ’dst be doing Dinah a 
wrong by telling Adam what thee think’st about her. It 
’ud do nothing but mischief : for it ’ud make Adam uneasy 
if he doesna feel the same to her. And I ’m pretty sure he 
feels nothing o’ the sort.” 

“ Eh, donna tell me what thee t’ sure on ; thee know’st 
nought about it. What ’s he allays goin’ to the Poysers’ for, 
if he didna want t’ see her? He goes twice where he used t’ 
go once. Happen he knowsna as he wants t’ see her; he 
knowsna as I put salt in ’s broth, but he’d miss it pretty quick 
if it warna there. He ’ll ne’er think o’ marrying if it isna put 
into ’s head ; an’ if thee ’dst any love for thy mother, thee ’dst 
put him up to ’t, an’ not let her go away out o’ my sight, 
when I might ha’ her to make a bit o’ comfort for me afore 
I go to bed to my old man under the white thorn.” 

500 


SUNDAY MORNING 


Nay, mother, ’’ said Seth, “ thee mustna think me un- 
kind ; but I should be going against my conscience if I took 
upon me to say what Dinah’s feelings are. And besides that, 
I think I should give offence to Adam by speaking to him 
at all about marrying; and I counsel thee not to do ’t. 
Thee may’st be quite deceived about Dinah ; nay, I ’m pretty 
sure, by words she said to me last Sabbath, as she ’s no mind 
to marry.” 

“ Eh, thee ’t as contrairy as the rest on ’em. If it war 
summat I didna want, it ’ud be done fast enough.” 

Lisbeth rose from the bench at this, and went out of the 
workshop, leaving Seth in much anxiety lest she should dis- 
turb Adam’s mind about Dinah. He consoled himself after 
a time with reflecting that, since Adam’s trouble, Lisbeth 
had been very timid about speaking to him on matters of 
feeling, and that she would hardly dare to approach this ten- 
derest of all subjects. Even if she did, he hoped Adam 
would not take much notice of what she said. 

Seth was right in believing that Lisbeth would be held in 
restraint by timidity ; and during the next three days the in- » 
tervals in which she had an opportunity of speaking to Adam 
were too rare and short to cause her any strong temptation. 
But in her long solitary hours she brooded over her regretful 
thoughts about Dinah, till they had grown very near that 
point of unmanageable strength when thoughts are apt to 
take wing out of their secret nest in a startling manner. And 
on Sunday morning when Seth went away to chapel at Tred- 
dleston, the dangerous opportunity came. 

Sunday morning was the happiest time in all the week to 
Lisbeth ; for as there was no service at Hayslope church till 
the afternoon, Adam was always at home, doing nothing but 
reading, — an occupation in which she could venture to 
interrupt him. Moreover, she had always a better dinner 
than usual to prepare for her sons, — very frequently for 
Adam and herself alone, Seth being often away the entire 
day; and the smell of the roast-meat before the clear fire 
in the clean kitchen, the clock ticking in a peaceful Sunday 
manner, her darling Adam seated near her in his best clothes, 
doing nothing very important, so that she could go and 
stroke her hand across his hair if she liked, and see him 


ADAM BEDE 


look up at her and smile, while Gyp, rather jealous, poked 
his muzzle up between them, — all these things made poor 
Lisbeth’s earthly paradise. 

The book Adam most often read on a Sunday morning 
was his large pictured Bible ; and this morning it lay open 
before him on the round white deal table in the kitchen ; for 
he sat there in spite of the fire, because he knew his mother 
liked to have him with her, and it was the only day in the 
week when he could indulge her in that way. You would 
have liked to see Adam reading his Bible ; he never opened 
it on a week-day, and so he came to it as a holiday book, 
serving him for history, biography, and poetry. He held 
one hand thrust between his waistcoat buttons, and the other 
ready to turn the pages; and in the course of the morning 
you would have seen many changes in his face. Sometimes 
his lips moved in semi-articulation, — it was when he came 
to -a speech that he could fancy himself uttering, such as 
Samuel’s dying speech to the people; then his eyebrows 
would be raised, and the corners of his mouth would quiver 
‘a little with sad sympathy, — something, perhaps old Isaac’s 
meeting with his son, touched him closely; at other times, 
over the New Testament, a very solemn look would come 
upon his face, and he would every now and then shake his 
head in. serious assent, or just lift up his hand and let it fall 
again ; and on some mornings, when he read in the Apoc- 
rypha, of which he was very fond, the son of Sirach’s keen- 
edged words would bring a delighted smile, though he also 
enjoyed the freedom of occasionally differing from an 
Apocryphal writer. For Adam knew the Articles quite well, 
as became a good churchman. 

Lisbeth, in the pauses of attending to her dinner, always 
sat opposite to him and watched him till she could rest no 
longer without going up to him and giving him a caress, to 
call his attention to her. This morning he was reading the 
Gospel according to Saint Matthew, and Lisbeth had been 
standing close by him for some minutes, stroking his hair, 
which was smoother than usual this morning, and looking 
down at the large page with silent wonderment at the mys- 
tery of letters. She was encouraged to continue this caress, 
because when she first went up to him, he had thrown him- 

502 


SUNDAY MORNING 


self back in his chair to look at her affectionately and say, 
Why, mother, thee look’st rare and hearty this morning. 
Eh, Gyp wants me t’ look at him ; he can’t abide to think I 
love thee the best.” Lisbeth said nothing, because she 
wanted to say so many things. And now there was a new 
leaf to be turned over, and it was a picture, — that of the 
angel seated on the great stone that has been rolled away 
from the sepulchre. This picture had one strong association 
in Lisbeth’s memory, for she had been reminded of it when 
she first saw Dinah ; and Adam had no sooner turned the 
page, and lifted the book sideways that they rriight look at 
the angel, than she said, That ’s her, — that ’s Dinah.” 

Adam smiled, and looking more intently at the angel’s 
face, said, — 

“ It is a bit like her ; but Dinah *s prettier, I think.” 

Well, then, if thee think’st her so pretty, why ar n’t fond 
on her? ” 

Adam looked up in surprise. Why, mother, dost think 
I don’t set store by Dinah ? ” 

Nay,” said Lisbeth, frightened at her own courage, yet 
feeling that she had broken the ice, and the waters must flow, 
whatever mischief they might do. What ’s th’ use o’ settin’ 
store by things as are thirty mile off? If thee wast fond 
enough on her, thee wouldstna let her go away.” 

“ But I ’ve no right t’ hinder her, if she thinks well,” said 
Adam, looking at his book as if he wanted to go on reading. 
He foresaw a series of complaints tending to nothing. Lis- 
beth sat down again in the chair opposite to him, as she 
said, — 

But she wouldna think well if thee wastna so contrairy.” 
Lisbeth dared not venture beyond a vague phrase yet. 

“Contrairy, mother?” Adam said, looking up again in 
some anxiety. “ What have I done? What dost mean? ” 

“ Why, thee '*t never look at nothin’, nor think o’ nothin’, 
but thy figurin’ an’ thy work,” said Lisbeth, half crying. 
“ An’ dost think thee canst go on so all thy life, as if thee 
wast a man cut out o’ timber ? An’ what wut do when thy 
mother’s gone, an’ nobody to take care on thee as thee 
gett’st a bit o’ victual comfortable i’ the mornin’ ? ” 

“ What hast got i’ thy mind, mother ? ” said Adam, vexed 

503 


ADAM BEDE 


at this whimpering. I canna see what thee 't driving at. Is 
there anything I could do for thee as I don’t do ? ” 

Ay, an’ that there is. Thee mightst do as I should ha’ 
somebody wi’ me to comfort me a bit, an’ wait on me when 
I ’m bad, an’ be good to me.” 

“ Well, mother, whose fault is it there isna some tidy body 
i’ th’ house t’ help thee? It isna by my wish as thee hast a 
stroke o’ work to do. We can afford it, — I ’ve told thee 
often enough. It ’ud be a deal better for us.” 

“ Eh, what ’s the use o’ talking o’ tidy bodies, when thee 
mean’st one o’ th’ wenches out o’ th’ village, or somebody 
from Treddles’on as I ne’er set eyes on i’ my life ? I ’d sooner 
make a shift an’ get into my own coffin afore I die, nor ha’ 
them folks to put me in.” 

Adam was silent, and tried to go on reading. That was 
the utmost severity he could show towards his mother on a 
Sunday morning. But Lisbeth had gone too far now to 
check herself, and after scarcely a minute’s quietness she 
began again. 

Thee mightst know well enough who ’t is I ’d like t’ ha’ 
wi’ me. It isna many folks I send for t’ come an’ see me, I 
reckon. An’ thee ’st had the fetchin’ on her times enow.” 

“ Thee mean’st Dinah, mother, I know,” said Adam. 
“ But it ’s no use setting thy mind on what can’t be. If 
Dinah ’ud be willing to stay at Hayslope, it is n’t likely she 
can come away from her aunt’s house, where they hold her 
like a daughter, and where she ’s more bound than she is to 
us. If it had been so that she could ha’ married Seth, that 
’ud ha’ been a great blessing to us, but we can’t have things 
just as we like in this life. Thee must try to make up thy 
mind to do without her.” 

“ Nay, but I canna ma’ up my mind, when she ’s just cut 
out for thee ; an’ nought shall ma’ me believe as God didna 
make her an’ send her there o’ purpose for thee. What ’s it 
sinnify about her bein’ a Methody? It ’ud happen wear out 
on her wi’ marryin’.” 

Adam threw himself back in his chair and looked at his 
mother. He understood now what she had been aiming at 
from the beginning of the conversation. It was as unreason- 
able, impracticable a wish as she had ever urged, but he 

504 


SUNDAY MORNING 


could not help being moved by so entirely new an idea. The 
chief point, however, was to chase away the notion from his 
mother’s mind as quickly as possible. 

“ Mother,” he said gravely, “ thee ’t talking wild. Don’t 
let me hear thee say such things again. It ’s no good talk- 
ing o’ what can never be. Dinah ’s not for marrying ; she ’s 
fixed her heart on a different sort o’ life.” 

“ Very like,” said Lisbeth, impatiently, — very like she ’s 
none for marr’ing, when them as she ’d be willin t’ marry 
wonna ax her. I shouldna ha’ been for marr’ing thy feyther if 
he ’d ne’er axed me ; an’ she ’s as fond o’ thee as e’er I war 
o’ Thias, poor fellow.” 

The blood rushed to Adam’s face, and for a few moments 
he was not quite conscious where he was; his mother and 
the kitchen had vanished for him, and he saw nothing but 
Dinah’s face turned up towards his. It seemed as if there 
were a resurrection of his dead joy. But he woke up very 
speedily from that dream (the waking was chill and sad); 
for it would have been very foolish in him to believe his moth- 
er’s words ; she could have no ground for them. He was 
prompted to express his disbelief very strongly, — perhaps 
that he might call forth the proofs, if there were any to be 
offered. 

What dost say such things for, mother, when thee ’st got 
no foundation for ’em ? Thee know’st nothing as gives thee 
a right to say that.” 

“ Then I knowna ought as gi’es me a right to say as the 
year ’s turned, for all I feel it first thing when I get up i’ th’ 
morning. She isna fond o’ Seth, I reckon, is she? She 
doesna want to marry him? But I can see as she doesna. 
behave tow’rt thee as she does tow’rt Seth. She makes no 
more o’ Seth ’s coming a-nigh her nor if he war Gyp, but 
she ’s all of a tremble when thee ’t a-sittin’ down by her at 
breakfast an’ a-looking at her. Thee think’st thy mother 
knows nought, but she war alive afore thee wast born.” 

But thee canstna be sure as the trembling means love ? ” 
said Adam, anxiously. 

“ Eh, what else should it mane ? It isna hate, I reckon. 
An’ what should she do but love thee? Thee ’t made to be 
loved, — for where ’s there a straighter, cliverer man ? An’ 

505 


ADAM BEDE 


what ’s it sinnify her bein’ a Methody ? It ’s on’y the mari- 
gold i’ th’ parridge.” 

Adam had thrust his hands in his pockets, and was look- 
ing down at the book on the table, without seeing any of 
the letters. He was trembling like a gold-seeker, who sees 
the strong promise of gold, but sees in the same moment a 
sickening vision of disappointment. He could not trust his 
mother’s insight ; she had seen what she wished to see. And 
yet, — and yet, now the suggestion had been made to him, 
he remembered so many things, very slight things, like the 
stirring of the water by an imperceptible breeze, which 
seemed to him some confirmation of his mother’s words. 

Lisbeth noticed that he was moved. She went on, — 

An’ thee ’t find out as thee ’t poorly aff when she ’s gone. 
Thee ’t fonder on her nor thee know’st. Thy eyes follow her 
about, welly as Gyp’s follow thee.” 

Adam could sit still no longer. He rose, took down his hat, 
and went out into the fields. 

The sunshine was on them, — that early autumn sunshine 
which we should know was not summer’s, even if there were 
not the touches of yellow on the lime and chestnut ; the Sun- 
day sunshine, too, which has more than autumnal calmness 
for the working man ; the morning sunshine, which still 
leaves the dew-crystals on the fine gossamer webs in the 
shadow of the bushy hedgerows. 

Adam needed the calm influence ; he was amazed at the 
way in which this new thought of Dinah’s love had taken 
possession of him, with an overmastering power that made 
all other feelings give way before the impetuous desire to 
know that the thought was true. Strange that till that mo- 
ment the possibility of their ever being lovers had never 
crossed his mind, and yet now all his longing suddenly went 
out towards that possibility ; he had no more doubt or hesi- 
tation as to his own wishes than the bird that flies towards 
the opening through which the daylight gleams and the 
breath of heaven enters. 

The autumnal Sunday sunshine soothed him ; but not by 
preparing him with resignation to the disappointment if his 
mother — if he himself proved to be mistaken about Dinah : 
it soothed him by gentle encouragement of his hopes. Her 

506 


SUNDAY MORNING 

love was so like that calm sunshine that they seemed to make 
one presence to him, and he believed in them both alike. 
And Dinah was so bound up with the sad memories of his 
first passion, that he was not forsaking them, but rather giv- 
ing them a new sacredness by loving her. Nay, his love for 
her had grown out of that past; it was the noon of that 
morning. 

But Seth? Would the lad be hurt? Hardly; for he had 
seemed quite contented of late, and there was no selfish jeal- 
ousy in him : he had never been jealous of his mother’s fond- 
ness for Adam. But had he seen anything of what their 
mother talked about? Adam longed to know this, for he 
thought he could trust Seth’s observation better than his 
mother’s. He must talk to Seth before he went to see Dinah ; 
and with this intention in his mind, he walked back to the 
cottage and said to his mother, — 

“ Did Seth say anything to thee about when he was com- 
ing home? Will he be back to dinner? ” 

Ay, lad ; he ’ll be back, for a wonder. He isna gone to 
Treddles’on. He ’s gone somewhere else a-preachin’ and 
a-prayin’.” 

Hast any notion which way he ’s gone ? ” said Adam. 

“ Nay, but he aften goes to th’ Common. Thee know’st 
more o’ ’s goings nor I do.” 

Adam wanted to go and meet Seth, but he must content 
himself with walking about the near fields and getting sight 
of him as soon as possible. That would not be for more than 
an hour to come, for Seth would scarcely be at home much 
before their dinner-time, which was twelve o’clock. But 
Adam could not sit down to his reading again, and he saun- 
tered along by the brook and stood leaning against the stiles, 
with eager, intense eyes, which looked as if they saw some- 
thing very vividly ; but it was not the brook or the willows, 
not the fields or the sky. Again and again his vision was 
interrupted by wonder at the strength of his own feeling, at 
the strength and sweetness of this new love, — almost like 
the wonder a man feels at the added power he finds in him- 
self for an art which he had laid aside for a space. How is it 
that the poets have said so many fine things about our first 
love, so few about our later love? Are their first poems 

507 


ADAM BEDE 


their best? or are not those the best which come from their 
fuller thought, their larger experience, their deeper-rooted 
affections? The boy’s flute-like voice has its own spring 
charm ; but the man should yield a richer, deeper music. 

At last there was Seth, visible at the farthest stile, and 
Adam hastened to meet him. Seth was surprised, and 
thought something unusual must have happened ; but when 
Adam came up, his face said plainly enough that it was 
nothing alarming. 

‘‘ Where hast .been? ” said Adam, when they were side by 
side. 

I ’ve been to the Common,” said Seth. “ Dinah ’s been 
speaking the Word to a little company of hearers at Brim- 
stone’s, as they call him. They ’re folks as never go to 
church hardly — them on the Common — but they ’ll go and 
hear Dinah a bit. She ’s been speaking with power this 
forenoon from the words, ‘ I came not to call the righteous, 
but sinners to repentance.’ And there was a little thing 
happened as was pretty to see. The women mostly bring 
their children with ’em, but to-day there was one stout curly- 
headed fellow about three or four year old, that I never saw 
there before. He was as naughty as could be at the begin- 
ning while I was praying, and while we was singing; but 
when we all sat down and Dinah began to speak, th’ young 
’un stood stock-still all at once, and began to look at her 
with ’s mouth open, and presently he ran away from ’s 
mother and went up to Dinah, and pulled at her, like a little 
dog, for her to take notice of him. So Dinah lifted him up 
and held th’ lad on her lap, while she went on speaking; 
and he was as good as could be till he went to sleep — and 
the mother cried to see him.” 

'' It ’s a pity she shouldna be a mother herself,” said Adam, 
“ so fond as the children are of her. Dost think she ’s quite 
fixed against marrying, Seth ? Dost think nothing ’ud turn 
her? ” 

There was something peculiar in his brother’s tone, which 
made Seth steal a glance at his face before he answered. 

“ It ’ud be wrong of me to say nothing ’ud turn her,” he 
answered. ‘‘ But if thee mean’st it about myself, I ’ve given 

508 


SUNDAY MORNING 


up all thoughts as she can ever be my wife. Sh 
her brother, and that ’s enough.” 

But dost think she might ever get fond enough ot 
body else to be willing to marry ’em?” said Adam, rath, 
shyly. 

“ Well,” said Seth, after some hesitation, it ’s crossed my 
mind sometimes o’ late as she might; but Dinah ’ud let no 
fondness for the creature draw her out o’ the path as she be- 
lieved God had marked out for her. If she thought the 
leading was not from him, she ’s not one to be brought un- 
der the power of it. And she ’s allays seemed clear about 
that, — as her work was to minister t’ others, and make no 
home for herself i’ this world.” 

“ But suppose,” said Adam, earnestly, — “ suppose there 
was a man as ’ud let her do just the same and not interfere 
with her, — she might do a good deal o’ what she does now, 
just as well when she was married as when she was single. 
Other women of her sort have married, — that ’s to say, not 
just like her, but women as preached and attended on the 
sick and needy. There ’s Mrs. Fletcher as she talks of.” 

A new light had broken in on Seth. He turned round, 
and laying his hand on Adam’s shoulder, said, “ Why, 
wouldst like her to marry thee^ brother ? ” 

Adam looked doubtfully at Seth’s inquiring eyes, and 
said, “ Wouldst be hurt if she was to be fonder o’ me than o’ 
thee ? ” 

‘‘ Nay,” said Seth, warmly, “ how canst think it? Have I 
felt thy trouble so little that I shouldna feel thy joy? ” 

There was silence a few moments as they walked on, and 
then Seth said, — 

“ I ’d no notion as thee ’dst ever think of her for a wife.” 

But is it o’ any use to think of her? ” said Adam ; what 
dost say ? Mother ’s made me as I hardly know where I am, 
with what she ’s been saying to me this forenoon. She says 
she ’s sure Dinah feels for me more than common, and ’ud be 
willing t’ have me. But I ’m afraid she speaks without book. 
I want to know if thee ’st seen anything.” 

“ It ’s a nice point to speak about,” said Seth, “ and I ’m 
afraid o’ being wrong ; besides, we ’ve no right t’ inter- 

509 


ADAM BEDE 


, ith people’s feelings when they would n’t tell ’em 
ives.” 

.ch paused. 

* But thee mightst ask her,” he said presently. '' She took 
no offence at me for asking, and thee ’st more right than I 
had, only thee ’t not in the Society. But Dinah does n’t hold 
wi’ them as are for keeping the Society so strict to them- 
selves. She does n’t mind about . making folks enter the 
Society, so as they ’re fit t’ enter the kingdom o’ God. Some 
o’ the brethren at Treddles’on are displeased with her for 
that.” 

Where will she be the rest o’ the day ? ” said Adam. 

“She said she shouldn’t leave the Farm again to-day,” 
said Seth, “ because it ’s her last Sabbath there, and she ’s 
going t’ read out o’ the big Bible wi’ the children.” 

Adam thought, but did not say, “ Then I ’ll go this after- 
noon ; for if I go to church my thoughts ’ull be with her all 
the while. They must sing th’ anthem without me to-day.” 


CHAPTER LIT 

•ADAM AND DINAH. 

I T was about three o’clock when Adam entered the farm- 
yard and roused Alick and the dogs from their Sunday 
dozing. Alick said everybody was gone to church “ but th’ 
young misses,” — so he called Dinah ; but this did not dis- 
appoint Adam, although the “ everybody ” was so liberal as 
to include Nancy the dairymaid, whose works of necessity 
were not unfrequently incompatible with church-going. 

There was perfect stillness about the house; the doors 
were all closed, and the very stones and tubs seemed quieter 
than usual. Adam heard the water gently dripping from 
the pump, — that was the only sound ; and he knocked at 
the house door rather softly, as was suitable in that still- 
ness. 

The door opened, and Dinah stood before him, colouring 
deeply with the great surprise of seeing Adam at this hour, 
when she knew it was his regular practice to be at church. 

510 


ADAM AND DINAH 


Yesterday he would have said to her without any difficulty, 
“ I came to see you, Dinah ; I knew the rest were not at 
home.” But to-day something prevented him from saying 
that, and he put out his hand to her in silence. Neither of 
them spoke, and yet both wished they could speak, as Adam 
entered, and they sat down. Dinah took the chair she had 
just left; it was at the corner of the table near the window, 
and there was a book lying on the table, but it was not open. 
She had been sitting perfectly still, looking at the small bit 
of clear fire in the bright grate. Adam sat down opposite 
her, in Mr. Poyser's three-cornered chair. 

"‘Your mother is not ill again, I hope, Adam?” Dinah 
said, recovering herself. “ Seth said she was well this morn- 
ing.” 

“ No, she ’s very hearty to-day,” said Adam, happy in the 
signs of Dinah’s feeling at the sight of him, but shy. 

“ There ’s nobody at home, you see,” Dinah said ; but 
you ’ll wait. You ’ve been hindered from going to church 
to-day, doubtless.” 

“ Yes,” Adam said, and then paused before he added, “ I 
was thinking about you ; that was the reason.” 

This confession was very awkward and sudden, Adam felt ; 
for he thought Dinah must understand all he meant. But 
the frankness of the words caused her immediately to inter- 
pret them into a renewal of his brotherly regrets that she 
was going away, and she answered calmly, — 

“ Do not be careful and troubled for me, Adam. I have 
all things and abound at Snowfield ; and my mind is at rest, 
for I am not seeking my own will in going.” 

“ But if things were different, Dinah,” said Adam, hesi- 
tatingly, — “ if you knew things that perhaps you don’t 
know now — ” 

Dinah looked at him inquiringly; but instead of going 
on, he reached a chair and brought it near the corner of the 
table where she was sitting. She wondered and was afraid ; 
and the next moment her thoughts flew to the past, — was 
it something about those distant unhappy ones that she 
did n’t know ? 

Adam looked at her ; it was so sweet to look at her eyes, 
which had now a self-forgetful questioning in them, — for 

511 


ADAM BEDE 


a moment he forgot that he wanted to say anything, or that 
it was necessary to tell her what he meant. 

“ Dinah,” he said suddenly, taking both her hands be- 
tween his, “ I love you with my whole heart and soul. I 
love you next to God, who made me.” 

Dinah’s lips became pale, like her cheeks, and she trem- 
bled violently under the shock of painful joy. Her hands 
were cold as death between Adam’s. She could not draw 
them away, because he held them fast. 

“ Don’t tell me you can’t love me, Dinah. Don’t tell me 
we must part, and pass our lives away from one another.” 

The tears were trembling in Dinah’s eyes, and they fell 
before she could answer. But she spoke in a quiet, low 
voice, — 

“Yes, dear Adam, we must submit to another Will; we 
must part.” 

“ Not if you love me, Dinah, — not if you love me,” Adam 
said passionately. “ Tell me, — tell me if you can love me 
better than a brother ? ” 

Dinah was too entirely reliant on the Supreme guidance 
to attempt to achieve any end by a deceptive concealment. 
She was recovering now from the first shock of emotion, 
and she looked at Adam with simple, sincere eyes as she 
said, — 

“Yes, Adam, my heart is drawn strongly towards you; 
and of my own will, if I had no clear showing to the con- 
trary, I could find my happiness in being near you, and 
ministering to you continually. I fear I should forget to 
rejoice and weep with others; nay, I fear I should forget 
the Divine presence, and seek no love but yours.” 

Adam did not speak immediately. They sat looking at 
each other in delicious silence, — for the first sense of mutual 
love excludes other feelings; it will have the soul all to 
itself. 

“ Then, Dinah,” Adam said at last, “ how can there be 
anything contrary to what ’s right in our belonging to one 
another and spending our lives together? Who put this 
great love into our hearts? Can anything be holier than 
that? For we can help one another in everything as is good. 
I ’d never think o’ putting myself between you and God, 

512 


ADAM AND DINAH 


and saying you ought n’t to do this, and you ought n’t to do 
that. You’d follow your conscience as much as you do 
now.” 

Yes, Adam,” Dinah said, “ I know marriage is a holy 
state for those who are truly called to it and have no other 
drawing; but from my childhood upward I have been led 
towards another path ; all my peace and my joy have come 
from having no life of my own, no wants, no wishes for my- 
self, and living only in God and those of his creatures whose 
sorrows and joys he has given me to know. Those have 
been very blessed years to me, and I feel that if I was to 
listen to any voice that would draw me aside from that path, 
I should be turning my back on the light that has shone 
upon me, and darkness and doubt would take hold of me. 
We could not bless each other, Adam, if there were doubts 
in my soui, and if I yearned, when it was too late, after that 
better part which had once been given me and I had put 
away from me.” 

“ But if a new feeling has come into your mind, Dinah, 
and if you love me so as to be willing to be nearer to me 
than to other people, is n’t that a sign that it ’s right for you 
to change your life ? Does n’t the love make it right when 
nothing else would ? ” 

'' Adam, my mind is full of questionings about that ; for 
now, since you tell me of your strong love towards me, what 
was clear to me has become dark again. I felt before that 
my heart was too strongly drawn towards you, and that 
your heart was not as mine; and the thought of you had 
taken hold of me, so that my soul had lost its freedom, and 
was becoming enslaved to an earthly affection, which made 
me anxious and careful about what should befall myself. 
For in all other affection I had been content with any small 
return, or with none ; but my heart was beginning to hunger 
after an equal* love from you. And I had no doubt that I 
must wrestle against that as a great temptation; and the 
command was clear that I must go away.” 

But now, dear, dear Dinah, now you know I love you 
better than you love me ... it ’s all different now. You 
won’t think o’ going ; you ’ll stay, and be my dear wife, and 

513 


ADAM BEDE 


I shall thank God for giving me my life as I never thanked 
him before/’ 

Adam, it ’s hard to me to turn a deaf ear . . . you know 
it ’s hard ; but a great fear is upon me. It seems to me as if 
you were stretching out your arms to me, and beckoning me 
to come and take my ease, and live for my own delight ; and 
Jesus, the Man of Sorrows, was standing looking towards 
me, and pointing to the sinful and suffering and afflicted. I 
have seen that again and again when I have been sitting in 
stillness and darkness, and a great terror has come upon 
me lest I should become hard, and a lover of self, and no 
more bear willingly the Redeemer’s cross.” 

Dinah had closed her eyes, and a faint shudder went 
through her. Adam,” she went on, “ you would n’t desire 
that we should seek a good through any unfaithfulness to 
the light that is in us ; you would n’t believe that could be a 
good. We are of one mind in that.” 

Yes, Dinah,” said Adam, sadly, “ I ’ll never be the man 
t’ urge you against your conscience. But I can’t give up 
the hope that you may come to see different. I don’t be- 
lieve your loving me could shut up your heart, — it ’s only 
adding to what you ’ve been before, not taking away from 
it ; for it seems to me it ’s the same with love and happiness 
as with sorrow, — the more we know of it the better we can 
feel what other people’s lives are or might be, and so we 
shall only be more tender to ’em, and wishful to help ’em. 
The more knowledge a man has, the better he ’ll do ’s work ; 
and feeling ’s a sort o’ knowledge.” 

Dinah was silent; her eyes were fixed in contemplation 
of something visible only to herself. Adam went on pres- 
ently with his pleading, — 

“ And you can do almost as much as you do now. I won’t 
ask you to go to church with me of a Sunday ; you shall go 
where you like among the people and teach ’em ; for though 
I like church best, I don’t put my soul above yours, as if my 
words was better for you to follow than your own conscience. 
And you can help the sick just as much, and you ’ll have 
more means o’ making ’em a bit comfortable ; and you ’ll 
be among all your friends as love you, and can help ’em 
and be a blessing to ’em till their dying day. Surely, Dinah, 

514 


ADAM AND DINAH 


you 'd be as near to God as if you was living lonely and 
away from me/’ 

Dinah made no answer for some time. Adam was still 
holding her hands, and looking at her with almost trembling 
anxiety, when she turned her grave, loving eyes on his, and 
said in rather a sad voice, — 

Adam, there is truth in what you say, and there ’s many 
of the brethren and sisters who have greater strength than 
I have, and find their hearts enlarged by the cares of hus- 
band and kindred. But I have not faith that it would be so 
with me, for since my affections have been set above meas- 
ure on you, I have had less peace and joy in God ; I have felt 
as it were a division in my heart. And think how it is with 
me, Adam, — that life I have led is like a land I have trod- 
den in blessedness since my childhood; and if I long for a 
moment to follow the voice which calls me to another land 
that I know not, I cannot but fear that my soul might here- 
after yearn for that early blessedness which I had forsaken; 
and where doubt enters there is not perfect love. I must 
wait for clearer guidance ; I must go from you, and we must 
submit ourselves entirely to the Divine Will. We are some- 
times required to lav our natural, lawful affections on the 
altar.” 

Adam dared not plead again, for Dinah’s was not the 
voice of caprice or insincerity. But it was very hard for him ; 
his eyes got dim as he looked at her. 

“ But you may come to feel satisfied ... to feel that you 
may come to me again, and we may never part, Dinah ? ” 

'‘We must submit ourselves, Adam. With time, our duty 
will be made clear. It may be when I have entered on my 
former life, I shall find all these new thoughts and wishes 
vanish, and become as things that were not. Then I shall 
know that my calling is not towards marriage. But we 
must wait.” 

'' Dinah,” said Adam, mournfully, you can’t love me so 
well as I love you, else you ’d have no doubts. But it ’s nat- 
ural you should n’t ; for I ’m not so good as you. I can’t 
doubt it 's right for me to love the best thing God ’s ever 
giyen me to know.” 

“ Nay, Adam ; it seems to me that my love for you is not 

515 


ADAM BEDE 


weak ; for my heart waits on your words and looks, almost 
as a little child waits on the help and tenderness of the strong 
on whom it depends. If the thought of you took slight hold 
of me, I should not fear that it would be an idol in the tem- 
ple. But you will strengthen me, — you will not hinder me 
in seeking to obey to the uttermost.” 

“ Let us go out into the sunshine, Dinah, and walk to- 
gether. I ’ll speak no word to disturb you.” 

They went out and walked towards the fields, where they 
would meet the family coming from church. Adam said. 
Take my arm, Dinah ; ” and she took it. That was the 
only change in their manner to each other since they were 
last walking together. But no sadness in the prospect of 
her going away — in the uncertainty of the issue — could 
rob the sweetness from Adam’s sense that Dinah loved him. 
He thought he would stay at the Hall Farm all that evening. 
He would be near her as long as he could. 

'' Heyday ! there ’s Adam along wi’ Dinah,” said Mr. Poy- 
ser, as he opened the far gate into the Home Close. “ I 
couldna think how he happened away from church. Why,” 
added good Martin, after a moment’s pause, “ what dost 
think has just jumped into my head? ” 

“ Summat as hadna far to jump, for it ’s just under our 
nose. You mean as Adam ’s fond o’ Dinah.” 

“ Ay ! hast ever had any notion of it before ? ” 

To be sure I have,” said Mrs. Poyser, who always de- 
clined, if possible, to be taken by surprise. I ’m not one 
o’ those as can see the cat i’ the dairy, an’ wonder what she ’s 
come after.” 

“ Thee never saidst a word to me about it.” 

‘‘ Well, I are n’t like a bird-clapper, forced to make a 
rattle when the wind blows on me. I can keep my own 
counsel when there ’s no good i’ speaking.” 

“ But Dinah ’ll ha’ none o’ him ; dost think she will ? ” 
Nay,” said Mrs. Poyser, not sufficiently on her guard 
against a possible surprise ; she ’ll never marry anybody, if 
he is n't a Methodist and a cripple.” 

“ It ud been a pretty thing, though, for ’em t’ marry,” 
said Martin, turning his head on one side, as if in pleased 


ADAM AND DINAH 


contemplation of his new idea. “ Thee Mst ha' liked it too, 
wouldstna ? " 

‘‘ Ah ! I should. I should ha' been sure of her then, as 
she would n't go away from me to Snowfield, welly thirty 
mile off, and me not got a creatur to look to, only neigh- 
bours, as are no kin to me, an' most of 'em women as I 'd be 
ashamed to show my face, if my dairy things war like their'n. 
There may well be streaky butter i' the market. An' I 
should be glad to see the poor thing settled like a Christian 
woman, with a house of her own over her head ; and we 'd 
stock her well wi' linen and feathers; for I love her next 
to my own children. An' she makes one feel safer when 
she 's i' the house ; tor she 's like the driven snow : anybody 
might sin for two as had her at their elbow." 

Dinah," said Tommy, running forward to meet her, 

mother says you 'll never marry anybody but a Methodist 
cripple. What a silly you must be ! " — a comment which 
Tommy followed up by seizing Dinah with both arms, and 
dancing along by her side with incommodious fondness. 

“ Why, Adam, we missed you i' the singing to-day," said 
Mr. Poyser. “ How was it ? " 

“ I wanted to see Dinah ; she 's going away so soon," 
said Adam. 

‘‘ Ah, lad ! can you persuade her to stop somehow? Find 
her a good husband somewhere i' the parish. If you 'll do 
that, we 'll forgive you for missing church. But, anyway, 
she isna going before the harvest-supper o' Wednesday, and 
you must come then. There 's Bartle Massey cornin’, an' 
happen Craig. You'll be sure an' come, now, at seven? 
The missis wonna have it a bit later." 

“ Ay," said Adam, “ I 'll come if I can. But I can't often 
say what I 'll do beforehand, for the work often holds me 
longer than I expect. You 'll stay till the end o' the week, 
Dinah?" 

Yes, yes ! " said Mr. Poyser ; we 'll have no nay." 

‘‘ She 's no call to be in a hurry," observed Mrs. Poyser. 

Scarceness o' victual 'ull keep ; there 's no need to be 
hasty wi' the cooking. An' scarceness is what there 's the 
biggest stock of i' that country." 

Dinah smiled, but gave no promise to stay, and they talked 

517 


ADAM BEDE 


of other things through the rest of the walk, lingering in 
the sunshine to look at the great flock of geese grazing, at 
the new corn-ricks, and at the surprising abundance of fruit 
on the old pear-tree ; Nancy and Molly having already has- 
tened home, side by side, each holding carefully wrapped in 
her pocket-handkerchief, a prayer-book, in which she could 
read little beyond the large letters and the Amens. 

Surely all other leisure is hurry compared with a sunny 
walk through the fields from afternoon church,” — as such 
walks used to be in those old leisurely times, when the boat, 
gliding sleepily along the canal, was the newest locomotive 
wonder ; when Sunday books had most of them old brown- 
leather covers, and opened with remarkable precision always 
in one place. Leisure is gone, — gone where the spinning- 
wheels are gone, and the pack-horses, and the slow wagons, 
and the pedlers, who brought bargains to the door on sunny 
afternoons. Ingenious philosophers tell you, perhaps, that 
the great work of the steam-engine is to create leisure for 
mankind. Do not believe them : it only creates a vacuum 
for eager thought to rush in. Even idleness is eager now, — 
eager for amusement; prone to excursion-trains, art-muse- 
ums, periodical literature, and exciting novels; prone even 
to scientific theorizing, and cursory peeps through micro- 
scopes. Old Leisure was quite a different personage: he 
only read one newspaper, innocent of leaders, and was free 
from that periodicity of sensations which we call post-time. 
He was a contemplative, rather stout gentleman, of excellent 
digestion, — of quiet perceptions, undiseased by hypothesis ; 
happy in his inability to know the causes of things, prefer- 
ring the things themselves. He lived chiefly in the country, 
among pleasant seats and homesteads, and was fond of 
sauntering by the fruit-tree wall, and scenting the apricots 
when they were warmed by the morning sunshine, or of 
sheltering himself under the orchard boughs at noon, when 
the summer pears were falling. He knew nothing of week- 
day services, and thought none the worse of the Sunday ser- 
mon if it allowed him to sleep from the text to the blessing, 
— liking the afternoon service best, because the prayers were 
the shortest, and not ashamed to say so ; for he had an easy, 
jolly conscience, broad-backed like himself, and able to carry 

5t8 


THE HARVEST SUPPER 


< a great deal of beer or port-wine, — not being made squeam- 
ish by doubts and qualms and lofty aspirations. Life was 
not a task to him, but a sinecure: he fingered the guineas 
in his pocket, and ate his dinners, and slept the sleep of the 
irresponsible ; for had he not kept up his character by going 
to church on the Sunday afternoons? 

Fine old Leisure ! Do not be severe upon him, and judge ‘ 
him by our modern standard ; he never went to Exeter Hall, 
or heard a popular preacher, or read “ Tracts for the Times ’’ 
or ‘‘ Sartor Resartus.’’ 


CHAPTER LHI. 


THE HARVEST SUPPER. 


S Adam was going homewards on Wednesday evening 



-/x in the six o’clock sunlight, he saw in the distance the 
last load of barley winding its way towards the yard-gate of 
the Hall Farm, and heard the chant of “ Harvest Home! ” 
rising and sinking like a wave. Fainter and fainter, and 
more musical through the growing distance, the falling, dy- 
ing sound still reached him, as he neared the Willow Brook. 
The low westering sun shone right on the shoulders of the 
old Binton Hills, turning the unconscious sheep into bright 
spots of light; shone on the windows of the cottage, too, 
and made them aflame with a glory beyond that of amber 
or amethyst. It was enough to make Adam feel that he 
was in a great temple, and that the distant chant was a 
sacred song. 

It ’s wonderful,” he thought, “ how that sound goes to 
one’s heart almost like a funeral bell, for all it tells one o’ 
the joy fullest time o’ the year, and the time when men are 
mostly the thankfullest. I suppose it ’s a bit hard to us to 
think anything ’s over and gone in our lives ; and there ’s 
a parting at the root of all our joys. It’s like what I feel 
about Dinah: I should never ha’ come to know that her 
love ’ud be the greatest o’ blessings to me, if what I counted 
a blessing had n’t been wrenched and torn away from me. 


519 


ADAM BEDE 


and left me with a greater need, so as I could crave and 
hunger for a greater and a better comfort/’ 

He expected to see Dinah again this evening, and get 
leave to accompany her as far as Oakbourne ; and then he 
would ask her to fix' some time when he might go to Snow- 
field, and learn whether the last best hope that had been 
born to him must be resigned like the rest. The work he 
had to do at home, besides putting on his best clothes, made 
it seven before he was on his way again to the Hall Farm, 
and it was questionable whether, with his longest and quick- 
est strides, he should be there in time even for the roast-beef, 
which came after the plum-pudding ; for Mrs. Poyser’s sup- 
per would be punctual. 

Great was the clatter of knives and pewter plates and tin 
cans when Adam entered the house, but there was no hum of 
voices to this accompaniment : the eating of excellent roast- 
beef, provided free of expense, was too serious a business to 
those good farm-labourers to be performed with a divided at- 
tention, even if they had had anything to say to each other, 
— which they had not ; and Mr. Poyser, at the head of the 
table, was too busy with his carving to listen to Bartle 
Massey’s or Mr. Craig’s ready talk. 

“ Here, Adam,” said Mrs. Poyser, who was standing and 
looking on to see that Molly and Nancy did their duty as 
waiters, “ here ’s a place kept for you between Mr. Massey 
and the boys. It ’s a poor tale you could n’t come to see 
the pudding when it was whole.” 

Adam looked anxiously round for a fourth woman’s figure, 
but Dinah was not there. He was almost afraid of asking 
about her; besides, his attention was claimed by greetings, 
and there remained the hope that Dinah was in the house, 
though perhaps disinclined to festivities on the eve of her 
departure. 

It was a goodly sight, — that table, with Martin Poyser’s 
round good-humoured face and large person at the head of 
it, helping his servants to the fragrant roast-beef, and pleased 
when the empty plates came again. Martin, though usually 
blest with a good appetite, really forgot to finish his own 
beef to-night, — it was so pleasant to him to look on in the 
intervals of carving, and see how the others enjoyed their 

520 


THE HARVEST SUPPER 


supper ; for were they not men who, on all the days of the 
year except Christmas Day and Sundays, ate their cold din- 
ner, in a make-shift manner, under the hedgerows, and drank 
their beer out of wooden bottles, — with relish certainly, but 
with their mouths towards the zenith, after a fashion more 
endurable to ducks than to human bipeds? Martin Poyser 
had some faint conception of the flavour such men must find 
in hot roast-beef and fresh-drawn ale. He held his head on 
one side, and screwed up his mouth, as he nudged Bartle 
Massey, and watched half-witted Tom Tholer, otherwise 
known as “ Tom Saft,” receiving his second plateful of beef. 
A grin of delight broke over Tom’s face as the plate was set 
down before him, between his knife and fork, which he held 
erect, as if they had been sacred tapers ; but the delight was 
too strong to continue smouldering in a grin, — it burst out 
the next instant in a long-drawn Haw, haw ! ” followed by 
a sudden collapse into utter gravity, as the knife and fork 
darted down on the prey. Martin Poyser’s large person 
shook with his silent, unctuous laugh; he turned towards 
Mrs. Poyser to see if she, too, had been observant of Tom, 
and the eyes of husband and wife met in a glance of good- 
natured amusement. 

'' Tom Saft ” was a great favourite on the farm, where he 
played the part of the old jester, and made up for his prac- 
tical deficiencies by his success in repartee. His hits, I im- 
agine, were those of the flail, which falls quite at random, 
but nevertheless smashes an insect now and then. They were 
much quoted at sheep-shearing and hay-making times ; but 
I refrain from recording them here, lest Tom’s wit should 
prove to be like that of many other bygone jesters eminent 
in their day, — rather of a temporary nature, not dealing 
with the deeper and more lasting relations of things. 

Tom excepted, Martin Poyser had some pride in his serv- 
ants and labourers, thinking with satisfaction that they were 
the best worth their pay of any set on the estate. There was 
Kester Bale, for example (Beale, probably, if the truth were 
known, but he was called Bale, and was not conscious of 
any claim to a fifth letter), — the old man with the close 
leather cap, and the network of wrinkles on his sun-browned 
face. Was there any man in Loamshire who knew better the 

521 


ADAM BEDE 


natur of all farming work ? He was one of those in- 
valuable labourers who can not only turn their hand to 
everything, but excel in everything they turn their hand to. 
It is true Kester’s knees were much bent outward by this 
time, and he walked with a perpetual courtesy, as if he were 
among the most reverent of men. And so he was ; but I am 
obliged to admit that the object of his reverence was his 
own skill, towards which he performed some rather affect- 
ing acts of worship. He always thatched the ricks; for if 
anything were his forte more than another, it was thatching ; 
and when the last touch had been put to the last beehive 
rick, Kester, whose home lay at some distance from the farm, 
would take a walk to the rickyard in his best clothes on a 
Sunday morning, and stand in the lane, at a due distance, 
to contemplate his own thatching, — walking about to get 
each rick from the proper point of view. As he courtesied 
along, with his eyes upturned to the straw knobs imitative 
of golden globes at the summits of the beehive ricks, which 
indeed were gold of the best sort, you might have imagined 
him to be engaged in some pagan act of adoration. Kester 
was an old bachelor, and reputed to have stockings full of 
coin, concerning which his master cracked a joke with him 
every pay-night, — not a new, unseasoned joke, but a good 
old one, that had been tried many times before, and had 
worn well. Th' young measter ’s a merry mon,” Kester 
frequently remarked ; for having begun his career by fright- 
ening away the crows under the last Martin Poyser but one, 
he could never cease to account the reigning Martin a young 
master. I am not ashamed of commemorating old Kester: 
you and I are indebted to the hard hands of such men, — 
hands that have long ago mingled with the soil they tilled 
so faithfully, thriftily making the best they could of the 
earth’s fruits, and receiving the smallest share as their own 
wages. 

Then, at the end of the table, opposite his master, there 
was Alick, the shepherd and head man, with the ruddy face 
and broad shoulders, not on the best terms with old Kester ; 
indeed, their intercourse was confined to an occasional snarl, 
for though they probably differed little concerning hedging 
and ditching and the treatment of ewes, there was a pro- 

522 


THE HARVEST SUPPER 


found difference of opinion between them as to their own 
respective merits. When Tityrus and Meliboeus happen to 
be on the same farm, they are not sentimentally polite to 
each other. Alick, indeed, was not by any means a honeyed 
man: his speech had usually something of a snarl in it, and 
his broad-shouldered aspect something of the bull-dog ex- 
pression, — Don’t you meddle with me, and I won’t meddle 
with you ; ” but he was honest even to the splitting of an 
oat-grain rather than he would take beyond his acknowl- 
edged share, and as “ close-fisted ” with his master’s prop- 
erty as if it had been his own, — throwing very small hand- 
fuls of damaged barley to the chickens, because a large 
handful affected his imagination painfully with a sense of 
profusion. Good-tempered Tim, the wagoner, who loved his 
horses, had his grudge against Alick in the matter of corn : 
they rarely spoke to each other, and never looked at each 
other, even over their dish of cold potatoes; but then, as 
this was their usual mode of behaviour towards all mankind, 
it would be an unsafe conclusion that they had more than 
transient fits of unfriendliness. The bucolic character at 
Hayslope, you perceive, was not of that entirely genial, 
merry, broad-grinning sort, apparently observed in most dis- 
tricts visited by artists. The mild radiance of a smile was 
a rare sight on a field-labourer’s face, and there was seldom 
any gradation between bovine gravity and a laugh. Nor 
was every labourer so honest as our friend Alick. At this 
very table, among Mr. Peyser’s men, there is that big Ben 
Tholoway, a very powerful thresher, but detected more than 
once in carrying away his master’s corn in his pockets, — an 
action which, as Ben was not a philosopher, could hardly be 
ascribed to absence of mind. However, his master had for- 
given him, and continued to employ him ; for the Tholo- 
ways had lived on the Common, time out of mind, and had 
always worked for the Poysers. And on the whole, I dare 
say, society was not much the worse because Ben had not 
six months of it at the treadmill ; for his views of depredation 
were narrow, and the House of Correction might have en- 
larged them. As it was, Ben ate his roast-beef to-night with 
a serene sense of having stolen nothing more than a few peas 
and beans as seed for his garden, since the last harvest-sup- 

523 


ADAM BEDE 


per, and felt warranted in thinking that Alick's suspicious 
eye, forever upon him, was an injury to his innocence. 

But now the roast-beef was finished and the cloth was 
drawn, leaving a fair large deal table for the bright drinking- 
cans and the foaming brown jugs and the bright brass can- 
dlesticks, pleasant to behold. Now the great ceremony of 
the evening was to begin, — the harvest-song, in which ev- 
ery man must join; he might be in tune, if he liked to be 
singular, but he must not sit with closed lips. The move- 
ment was obliged to be in triple time; the rest 'was ad 
libitum. 

As to the origin of this song, — whether it came in its 
actual state from the brain of a single rhapsodist, or was 
gradually perfected by a school or succession of rhapsodists, 
— I am ignorant. There is a stamp of unity, of individual 
genius upon it, which inclines me to the former hypothesis, 
though I am not blind to the consideration that this unity 
may rather have arisen from that consensus of many minds 
which was a condition of primitive thought, foreign to our 
modern consciousness. Some will perhaps think that they 
detect in the first quatrain an indication of a lost line, which 
later rhapsodists, failing in imaginative vigour, have sup- 
plied by the feeble device of iteration ; others, however, may 
rather maintain that this very iteration is an original felicity, 
to which none but the most prosaic minds can be insensible. 

The ceremony connected with the song was a drinking 
ceremony, (That is perhaps a painful fact, but then, you 
know, we cannot reform our forefathers.) During the first 
and second quatrain, sung decidedly forte, no can was filled. 

“ Here ’s a health unto our master. 

The founder of the feast; 

Here ’s a health unto our master 
And to our mistress! 

And may his doings prosper, 

Whate’er he takes in hand. 

For we are all his servants. 

And are at his command.” 

But now, immediately before the third quatrain, or chorus, 
sung fortissimo, with emphatic raps of the table, which gave 

.524 


THE HARVEST SUPPER 


the effect of cymbals and drum together, Alick’s can was 
filled, and he was bound to empty it before the chorus 
ceased. 

“Then drink, boys, drink! 

And see ye do not spill. 

For if ye do, ye shall drink two. 

For ’t is our master’s will.” 

When Alick had gone successfully through this test of 
steady-handed manliness, it was the turn of old Kester, at 
his right hand, — and so on, till every man had drunk his 
initiatory pint under the stimulus of the chorus. Tom Saft 
— the rogue — took care to spill a little by accident; but 
Mrs. Poyser (too officiously, Tom thought) interfered to pre- 
vent the exaction of the penalty. 

To any listener outside the door it would have been the 
reverse of obvious why the ‘‘ Drink, boys, drink 1 ” should 
have such an immediate and often-repeated encore ; but once 
entered, he would have seen that all faces were at present 
sober, and most of them serious : it was the regular and 
respectable thing for those excellent farm-labourers to do, 
as much as for elegant ladies and gentlemen to smirk and 
bow over their wine-glasses. Bartle Massey, whose ears 
were rather sensitive, had gone out to see what sort of even- 
ing it was, at an early stage in the ceremony ; and had not 
finished his contemplation until a silence of five minutes de- 
clared that “ Drink, boys, drink ! ’’ was not likely to begin 
again for the next twelvemonth. Much to the regret of the 
boys and Totty ; on them the stillness fell rather flat, after 
that glorious thumping of the table, towards which Totty, 
seated on her father's knee, contributed with her small might 
and small fist. 

When Bartle re-entered, however, there appeared to be a 
general desire for solo music after the choral. Nancy de- 
clared that Tim the wagoner knew a song, and was allays 
singing like a lark i' the stable ; " whereupon Mr. Poyser 
said encouragingly, “ Come, Tim, lad, let 's hear it.” 
Tim looked sheepish, tucked down his head, and said he 
could n’t sing ; but this encouraging invitation of the mas- 
ter's was echoed all round the table. It was a conversational 

525 


ADAM BEDE 


opportunity ; everybody could say, “ Come, Tim,” — except 
Alick, who never relaxed into the frivolity of unnecessary 
speech. At last Tim’s next neighbour, Ben Tholoway, be- 
gan to give emphasis to his speech by nudges, at which Tim, 
growing rather savage, said, “ Let me alooan, will ye ? else 
I ’ll ma’ ye sing a toon ye wonna like.” A good-tempered 
wagoner’s patience has limits, and Tim was not to be urged 
further.* 

“ Well, then, David, ye ’re the lad to sing,” said Ben, will- 
ing to show that he was not discomfited by this check. 

Sing ‘ My loove ’s a roos wi’out a thorn.’ ” 

The amatory David was a young man of an unconscious, 
abstracted expression, which was due probably to a squint 
of superior intensity rather than to any mental character- 
istic; for he was not indifferent to Ben’s invitation, but 
blushed and laughed and rubbed his sleeve over his mouth 
in a way that was regarded as a symptom of yielding. And 
for some time the company appeared to be much in earnest 
about the desire to hear David’s song; but in vain. The 
lyrism of the evening was in the cellar at present, and was not 
to be drawn from that retreat just yet. 

Meanwhile the conversation at the head of the table had 
taken a political turn. Mr. Craig was not above talking 
politics occasionally, though he piqued himself rather on a 
wise insight than on specific information. He saw so far 
beyond the mere facts of a case that really it was superfluous 
to know them. 

‘‘ I ’m no reader o’ the paper myself,” he observed to-night, 
as he filled his pipe, “ though I might read it fast enough if I 
liked, for there ’s Miss Lyddy has ’em and ’s done with ’em i’ 
no time ; but there ’s Mills, now, sits i’ the chimney-corner 
and reads the paper pretty nigh from morning to night, and 
when he ’s got to th’ end on ’t he ’s more addleheaded than 
he was at the beginning. He ’s full o’ this peace now, as 
they talk on ; he ’s been reading and reading, and thinks he ’s 
got to the bottom on ’t. ^ Why, Lor’, bless you. Mills,’ says 
I, ' you see no more into this thing nor you can see into the 
middle of a potato. I ’ll tell you what it is : you think it ’ll 
be a fine thing for the country ; and I ’m not again’ it, — 
mark my words, — I’m not again’ it. But it ’s my opinion 

526 


THE HARVEST SUPPER 


as there 's them at the head o' this country as are worse 
enemies to us nor Bony and all the mounseers he 's got at 's 
back ; for as for the mounseers, you may skewer half-a-dozen 
of ’em at once as if they war frogs.’ ” 

“ Ay, ay,” said Martin Poyser, listening with an air of 
much intelligence and edification, “ they ne’er ate a bit o’ 
beef i’ their lives. Mostly sallet, I reckon.” 

“ And says I to Mills,” continued Mr. Craig, “ ' Will you 
try to make me believe as furriners like them can do us 
half th’ harm them ministers do with their bad government ? 
If King George ’ud turn ’em all away and govern by him- 
self, he ’d see everything righted. He might take on Billy 
Pitt again if he liked ; but I don’t see myself what we want 
wi’ anybody besides King and Parliament. It ’s that nest 
o’ ministers does the mischief, I tell you.’ ” 

‘‘ Ah, it ’s fine talking,” observed Mrs. Poyser, who was 
now seated near her husband, with Totty on her lap, — “ it ’s 
fine talking. It ’s hard work to tell which is Old Harry when 
everybody ’s got boots on.” 

“ As for this peace,” said Mr. Poyser, turning his head on 
one side in a dubitative manner, and giving a precautionary 
puff to his pipe between each sentence, I don’t know. Th’ 
war ’s a fine thing for the country, an’ how ’ll you keep up 
prices wi’out it? An’ them French are a wicked sort o’ folks, 
by what I can make out ; what can you do better nor fight 
’em?” 

‘‘Ye ’re partly right there, Poyser,” said Mr. Craig, “ but 
I ’m not again’ the peace, — to make a holiday for a bit. We 
can break it when we like, an’ I ’m in no fear o’ Bony, for all 
they talk so much o’ his cliverness. That ’s what I says to 
Mills this morning. Lor’ bless you, he sees no more through 
Bony! . . . Why, I put him up to more in three minutes 
than he gets from ’s paper all the year round. Says I, ‘ Am I 
a gardener as knows his business, or arn’t I, Mills? answer’ 
me that.’ ‘ To be sure y* are, Craig,’ says he, — he ’s not a 
bad fellow. Mills isn’t, for a butler, but weak i’ the head. 

‘ Well,’ says I, ‘ you talk o’ Bony’s cliverness ; would it be 
any use my being a first-rate gardener if I ’d got nought but 
a quagmire to work on?’ ‘No,’ says he. ‘Well,’ I says, 

527 


ADAM BEDE 


^ that ’s just what it is wi' Bony. I ’ll not deny but he may 
be a bit diver, — he ’s no Frenchman born, as I understand ; 
but what ’s he got at ’s back but mounseers ? ’ ” 

Mr. Craig paused a moment with an emphatic stare after 
this triumphant specimen of Socratic argument, and then 
added, thumping the table rather fiercely, — 

“Why, it’s a sure thing — and there’s them ’ull bear 
witness to ’t — as i’ one regiment where there was one man 
a-missing, they put the regimentals on a big monkey, and 
they fit him as the shell fits the walnut, and you could n’t 
tell the monkey from the mounseers ! ” 

“ Ah ! think o’ that, now ! ” said Mr. Poyser, impressed 
at once with the political bearings of the fact, and with its 
striking interest as an anecdote in natural history. 

“ Come, Craig,” said Adam, “ that ’s a little too strong. 
You don’t believe that. It ’s all nonsense about the French 
being such poor sticks. Mr. Irwine ’s seen ’em in their own 
country, and he says they ’ve plenty o’ fine fellows among 
’em. And as for knowledge and contrivances and manu- 
factures, there ’s a many things as we ’re a fine sight behind 
’em in. It ’s poor foolishness to run down your enemies. 
Why, Nelson and the rest of ’em ’ud have no merit i’ beating 
’em, if they were such offal as folks pretend.” 

Mr. Poyser looked doubtfully at Mr. Craig, puzzled by 
this opposition of authorities. Mr. Irwine’s testimony was 
not to be disputed; but, on the other hand, Craig was a 
knowing fellow, and his view was less startling. Martin 
had never “ heard tell ” of the French being good for much. 
Mr. Craig had found no answer but such as was implied in 
taking a long draught of ale, and then looking down fixedly 
at the proportions of his own leg, which he turned a little 
outward for that purpose, when Bartle Massey returned from 
the fireplace, where he had been smoking his first pipe in 
quiet, and broke the silence by saying, as he thrust his fore- 
finger into the canister, — 

“ Why, Adam, how happened you not to be at church on 
Sunday? Answer me that, you rascal! The anthem went 
limping without you. Are you going to disgrace your 
schoolmaster in his old age?” 

528 


THE HARVEST SUPPER 


'' No, Mr. Massey,” said Adam. '' Mr. and Mrs. Poyser 
can tell you where I was. I was in no bad company.” 

She ‘s gone, Adam, — gone to Snowfield,” said Mr. Poy- 
ser, reminded of Dinah for the first time this evening. ‘‘ I 
thought you ’d ha' persuaded her better. Nought 'ud hold 
her, but she must go yesterday forenoon. The missis has 
hardly got over it. I thought she 'd ha’ no sperrit for th’ 
harvest supper.” 

Mrs. Poyser had thought of Dinah several times since 
Adam had come in, but she had had '' no heart ” to mention 
the bad news. 

“ What ! ” said Bartle, with an air of disgust. Was there 
a woman concerned? Then I give you up, Adam.” 

“ But it ’s a woman you ’n spoke well on, Bartle,” said 
Mr. Poyser. Come, now, you oanna draw back ; you said 
once as women wouldna ha’ been a bad invention if they ’d 
all been like Dinah.” 

I meant her voice, man, — I meant her voice, that was 
all,” said Bartle. I can bear to hear her speak without * 
wanting to put wool in my ears. As for other things, I dare 
say she ’s like the rest o’ the women, — thinks two and two ’ll 
come to make five, if she cries and bothers enough about it.” 

Ay, ay ! ” said Mrs. Poyser ; '' one ’ud think, an’ hear 
some folks talk, as the men war ’cute enough to count the 
corns in a bag o’ wheat wi’ only smelling at it. They can 
see through a barn-door, they can. Perhaps that ’s the rea- 
son they can see so little o’ this side on ’t.” 

Martin Poyser shook with delighted laughter, and winked 
at Adam, as much as to say the schoolmaster was in for it 
now. 

“ Ah ! ” said Bartle, sneeringly, “ the women are quick 
enough, — they ’re quick enough. They know the rights of 
a story before they hear it, and can tell a man what his 
thoughts are before he knows ’em himself.” 

'' Like enough,” said Mrs. Poyser ; ‘‘ for the men are most- 
ly so slow, their thoughts overrun ’em, an’ they can only 
catch ’em by th-e tail. I can count a stocking-top while a 
man ’s getting ’s tongue ready ; an’ when he outs wi’ his 
speech at last, there ’s little broth to be made on ’t. It ’s 
your dead chicks take the longest hatchin’. Howiver, I ’m 

529 


34 


ADAM BEDE 


not denyin’ the women are foolish ; God Almighty made ’em 
to match the men.” 

Match ! ” said Bartle ; ‘‘ ay, as vinegar matches one’s 
teeth. If a man says a word, his wife’ll match it with a 
contradiction ; if he ’s a mind for hot meat, his wife ’ll match 
it with cold bacon ; if he laughs, she ’ll match him with 
whimpering. She ’s such a match as the horse-fly is to th’ 
horse : she ’s got the right venom to sting him with, — the 
right venom to sting him with.” 

Yes,” said Mrs. Poyser, I know what the men like, — 
a poor soft, as ’ud simper at ’em like the pictur’ o’ the sun, 
whether they did right or wrong, an’ say thank you for a 
kick, an’ pretend she didna know which end she stood upper- 
most, till her husband told her. That ’s what a man wants in 
a wife, mostly ; he wants to make sure o’ one fool as ’ull tell 
him he ’s wise. But there ’s some men can do wi’out that, — 
they think so much o’ themselves a’ready ; an’ that ’s how 
it is there ’s old bachelors.” 

Come, Craig,” said Mr. Poyser, jocosely, “ you mun get 
married pretty quick, else you ’ll be set down for an old 
bachelor ; an’ you see what the women ’ull think on you.” 

“ Well,” said Mr. Craig, willing to conciliate Mrs. Poyser, 
and setting a high value on his own compliments, I like a 
cleverish woman, a woman o’ sperrit, a managing woman.” 

“You’re out there, Craig,” said Bartle, dryly; “you’re 
out there. You judge o’ your garden-stuff on a better plan 
than that ; you pick the things for what they can excel in, 
— for what they can excel in. You don’t value your peas 
for their roots, or your carrots for their flowers. Now, that ’s 
the way you should choose women ; their cleverness ’ll 
never come to much, — never come to much ; but they make 
excellent simpletons, ripe and strong-flavoured.” 

“ What dost say to that ? ” said Mr. Poyser, throwing 
himself back and looking merrily at his wife. 

“ Say ! ” answered Mrs. Poyser, with dangerous fire kin- 
dling in her eye ; “ why, I say as some folks’ tongues are 
like the clocks as run on strikin’, not to tell you the time o’ 
the day, but because there ’s summat wrong i’ their own in- 
side— ” 


530 


THE HARVEST SUPPER 


Mrs. Poyser would probably have brought her rejoinder 
to a further climax, if every one’s attention had not at this 
moment been called to the other end of the table, where the 
lyrism, which had at first only manifested itself by David’s 
sotto voce performance of “ My love ’s a rose without a 
thorn,” had gradually assumed a rather deafening and com- 
plex character. Tim, thinking slightly of David’s vocaliza- 
tion, was impelled to supersede that feeble buzz by a spirited 
commencement of “ Three Merry Mowers ; ” but David was 
not to be put down so easily, and showed himself capable of 
a copious crescendo, which was rendering it doubtful whether 
the rose would not predominate over the mowers, when old 
Kester, with an entirely unmoved and immovable aspect, 
suddenly set up a quavering treble, — as if he had been an 
alarum, and the time was come for him to go off. 

The company at Alick’s end of the table took this form 
of vocal entertainment very much as a matter of course, be- 
ing free from musical prejudices; but Bartle Massey laid 
down his pipe and put his fingers in his ears; and Adam, 
who had been longing to go ever since he had heard Dinah 
was not in the house, rose, and said he must bid good-night. 

I ’ll go with you, lad,” said Bartle ; “ I ’ll go with you 
before my ears are split.” 

“ I ’ll go round by the Common, and see you home, if you 
like, Mr. Massey,” said Adam. 

“ Ay, ay ! ” said Bartle ; “ then we can have a bit o’ talk 
together. I never get hold of you now.” 

Eh ! it ’s a pity but you ’d sit it out,” said Martin Poy- 
ser. “ They ’ll all go soon ; for th’ missis niver lets ’em 
stay past ten.” 

But Adam was resolute; so the good-nights were said, 
and the two friends turned out on their star-light walk to- 
gether. 

‘‘ There ’s that poor fool. Vixen, whimpering for me at 
home,” said Bartle. I can never bring her here with me 
for fear she should be struck with Mrs. Poyser’s eye, and 
the poor bitch might go limping forever after.” 

I ’ve never any need to drive Gyp back,” said Adam, 
laughing. '' He always turns back of his own head when he 
finds out I ’m coming here.’* 


531 


ADAM BEDE 


“ Ay, ay,” said Bartle. A terrible woman ! — made of 
needles, — made of needles. But I stick to Martin, — I shall 
always stick to Martin. And he likes the needles, God help 
him ! He 's a cushion made on purpose for 'em.” 

“ But she ’s a downright good-natur’d woman, for all that,” 
said Adam, and as true as the daylight. She 's a bit cross 
wi’ the dogs when they offer to come in th’ house; but if 
they depended on her, she 'd take care and have 'em well fed. 
If her tongue 's keen, her heart 's tender : I 've seen that 
in times o' trouble. She 's one o' those women as are better 
than their word.” 

‘‘ Well, well,” said Bartle, I don't say th' apple is n't 
sound at the core; but it sets my teeth on edge, — it sets 
my teeth on edge.” 


CHAPTER LIV. 

THE MEETING ON THE HILL. 

A dam understood Dinah's haste to go away, and drew 
hope rather than discouragement from it. She was 
fearful lest the strength of her feeling towards him should 
hinder her from waiting and listening faithfully for the ulti- 
mate guiding voice from within. 

“ I wish I 'd asked her to write to me, though,” he thought. 
“ And yet even that might disturb her a bit, perhaps. She 
wants to be quite quiet in her old way for a while. And 
I 've no right to be impatient and interrupting her with my 
wishes. She 's told me what her mind is ; and she 's not a 
woman to say one thing and mean another. I 'll wait pa- 
tiently.” 

That was Adam's wise resolution, and it throve excellently 
for the first two or three weeks on the nourishment it got 
from the remembrance of Dinah's confession that Sunday 
afternoon. There is a wonderful amount of sustenance in 
the first few words of love. But towards the middle of Octo- 
ber the resolution began to dwindle perceptibly, and showed 
dangerous symptoms of exhaustion. The weeks were un- 
usually long ; Dinah must surely have had more than enough 

532 


THE MEETING ON THE HILL 


time to make up her mind. Let a woman say what she will 
after she has once told a man that she loves him, he is a 
little too flushed and exalted with that first draught she 
offers him to care much about the taste of the second; he 
treads the earth with a very elastic step as he walks away 
from her, and makes light of all difficulties. But that sort 
of glow dies out ; memory gets sadly diluted with time, and 
is not strong enough to revive us. Adam was no longer so 
confident as he had been; he began to fear that perhaps 
Dinah’s old life would have too strong a grasp upon her for 
any new feeling to triumph. If she had not felt this, she 
would surely have written to him to give him some comfort ; 
but it appeared that she held it right to discourage him. As 
Adam’s confidence waned, his patience waned with it, and 
he thought he must write himself; he must ask Dinah not 
to leave him in painful doubt longer than was needful. He 
sat up late one night to write her a letter, but the next 
morning he burnt it, afraid of its effect. It would be worse 
to have a discouraging answer by letter than from her own 
lips, for her presenec reconciled him to her will. 

You perceive how it was: Adam was hungering for the 
sight of Dinah; and when that sort of hunger reaches a 
certain stage, a lover is likely to still it, though he may have 
to put his future in pawn. 

But what harm could he do by going to Snowfield? 
Dinah could not be displeased with him for it : she had not 
forbidden him to go ; she must surely expect that he would 
go before long. By the second Sunday in October this view 
of the case had become so clear to Adam that he was already 
on his way to Snowfield; on horseback this time, for his 
hours were precious now, and he had borrowed Jonathan 
Burge’s good nag for the journey. 

What keen memories went along the road with him ! He 
had often been to Oakbourne and back since that first jour- 
ney to Snowfield; but beyond Oakbourne the gray stone 
walls, the broken country, the meagre trees, seemed to be 
telling him afresh the story of that painful past which he 
knew so well by heart. But no story is the same to us after 
a lapse of time, — or rather, we who read it are no longer 
the same interpreters ; and Adam this morning brought with 

533 


ADAM BEDE 


him new thoughts through that gray country, — thoughts 
which gave an altered significance to its story of the past. 

That is a base and selfish, even a blasphemous spirit, 
which rejoices and is thankful over the past evil that has 
blighted or crashed another, because it has been made a 
source of unforeseen good to ourselves. Adam could never 
cease to mourn over that mystery of human sorrow which 
had been brought so close to him ; he could never thank 
God for another's misery. And if I were capable of that 
narrow-sighted joy in Adam's behalf, I should still know he 
was not the man to feel it for himself ; he would have shaken 
his head at such a sentiment, and said : “ Evil 's evil, and 

sorrow 's sorrow ; and you can't alter its natur' by wrap- 
ping it up in other words. Other folks were not created for 
my sake, that I should think all square when things turn out 
well for me." 

But it is not ignoble to feel that the fuller life which a sad 
experience has brought us is worth our own personal share 
of pain ; surely it is not possible to feel otherwise, any more 
than it would be possible for a man with cataract to regret 
the painful process by which his dim blurred sight of men as 
trees walking had been exchanged for clear outline and ef- 
fulgent day. The growth of higher feeling within us is like 
the growth of faculty, bringing with it a sense of added 
strength ; we can no more wish to return to a narrower sym- 
pathy than a painter or a musician can wish to return to his 
cruder manner, or a philosopher to his less complete formula. 

Something like this sense of enlarged being was in Adam's 
mind this Sunday morning, as he rode along in vivid recol- 
lection of the past. His feeling towards Dinah, the hope of 
passing his life with her, had been the distant unseen point 
towards which that hard journey from Snowfield eighteen 
months ago had been leading him. Tender and deep as his 
love for Hetty had been, — so deep that the roots of it would 
never be torn away, — his love for Dinah was better and 
more precious to him ; for it was the outgrowth of that fuller 
life which had come to him from his acquaintance with deep 
sorrow. ‘‘ It 's like as if it was a new strength to me," he 
said to himself, “ to love her, and know as she loves me. I 
shall look t' her to help me to see things right. For she 's 

534 


THE MEETING ON THE HILL 


better than I am, — there ’s less o’ self in her, and pride. 
And it ’s a feeling as gives you a sort o’ libert/, as if you 
could walk more fearless, when you ’ve more trust in an- 
other than y’ have in yourself. I ’ve always been thinking I 
knew better than them as belonged to me, and that ’s a poor 
sort o’ life, when you can’t look to them nearest to you t’ 
help you with a bit better thought than what you ’ve got in- 
side you a’ready.” 

It was more than two o’clock in the afternoon when Adam 
came in sight of the gray town on the hillside, and looked 
searchingly towards the green valley below, for the first 
glimpse of the old thatched roof near the ugly red mill. The 
scene looked less harsh in the soft October sunshine than it 
had done in the eager time of early spring; and the one 
grand charm it possessed in common with all wide-stretch- 
ing woodless regions — that it filled you with a new con- 
sciousness of the over-arching sky — had a milder, more 
soothing influence than usual, on this almost cloudless day. 
Adam’s doubts and fears melted under this influence as the 
delicate web-like clouds had gradually melted away into the 
clear blue above him. He seemed to see Dinah’s gentle face 
assuring him, with its looks alone, of all he longed to know. 

He did not expect Dinah to be at home at this hour, but 
he got down from his horse and tied it at the little gate, that 
he might ask where she was gone to-day. He had set his 
mind on following her and bringing her home. She was 
gone to Sloman’s End, a hamlet about three miles off, over 
the hill, the old v/oman told him ; had set off directly after 
morning chapel, to preach in a cottage there, as her habit 
was. Anybody at the town would tell him the way to Slo- 
man’s End. So Adam got on his horse again and rode to 
the town, putting up at the old inn, and taking a hasty 
dinner there in the company of the too chatty landlord, from 
whose friendly questions and reminiscences he was glad to 
escape as soon as possible, and set out towards Sloman’s 
End. With all his haste it was nearly four o’clock before he 
could set off, and he thought that as Dinah had gone so 
early, she would perhaps already be near returning. The 
little, gray, desolate-looking hamlet, unscreened by shelter- 
ing trees, lay in sight long before he reached it ; and as he 

535 


ADAM BEDE 


came near he could hear the sound of voices singing a 
hymn. “ Perhaps that ’s the last hymn before they come 
away,” Adam thought ; I ’ll walk back a bit, and turn 
again to meet her further off the village.” He walked back 
till he got nearly to the top of the hill again, and seated 
himself on a loose stone against the low wall, to watch till 
he should see the little black figure leaving the hamlet and 
winding up the hill. He chose this spot, almost at the top 
of the hill, because it was away from all eyes, — no house, 
no cattle, not even a nibbling sheep near, — no presence but 
the still lights and shadows, and the great embracing sky. 

She was much longer coming than he expected ; he waited 
an hour at least, watching for her and thinking of her, while 
the afternoon shadows lengthened, and the light grew softer. 
At last he saw the little black figure coming from between 
the gray houses, and gradually approaching the foot of the 
hill. Slowly, Adam thought ; but Dinah was really walking 
at her usual pace, with a light quiet step. Now she was be- 
ginning to wind along the path up the hill, but Adam would 
not move yet : he would not meet her too soon ; he had set 
his heart on meeting her in this assured loneliness. And 
now he began to fear lest he should startle her too much. 
“ Yet,” he thought, she ’s not one to be over-startled ; she ’s 
always so calm and quiet, as if she was prepared for any- 
thing.” 

What was she thinking of as she wound up the hill? 
Perhaps she had found complete repose without him, and had 
ceased to feel any need of his love. On the verge of a de- 
cision we all tremble ; hope pauses with fluttering wings. 

But now at last she was very near, and Adam rose from 
the stone-wall. It happened that just as he walked forward, 
Dinah had paused and turned round to look back at the 
village: who does not pause and look back in mounting a 
hill? Adam was glad; for with the fine instinct of a lover, 
he felt that it would be best for her to hear his voice before 
she saw him. He came within three paces of her, and then 
said, Dinah ! ” She started without looking round, as if 
she connected the sound with no place. “ Dinah ! ” Adam 
said again. He knew quite well what was in her mind. She 
was so accustomed to think of impressions as purely spiritual 

536 


MARRIAGE BELLS 


monitions, that she looked for no material, visible accom- 
paniment of the voice. 

But this second time she looked round. What a look of 
yearning love it was that the mild gray eyes turned on the 
strong dark-eyed man ! She did not start again at the sight 
of him; she said nothing, but moved towards him so that 
his arm could clasp her round. 

And they walked on so in silence, while warm tears fell. 
Adam was content, and said nothing. It was Dinah who 
spoke first. 

“ Adam,” she said, “ it is the Divine Will. My soul is so 
knit to yours that it is but a divided life I live without you. 
And this moment, now you are with me, and I feel that our 
hearts are filled with the same love, I have a fulness of 
strength to bear and do our Heavenly Father’s will, that I 
had lost before.” 

Adam paused and looked into her sincere eyes. 

“ Then we ’ll never part any more, Dinah, till death parts 
us.” 

And they kissed each other with a deep joy. 

What greater thing is there for two human souls, than 
to feel that they are joined for life, — to strengthen each 
other in all labour, to rest on each other in all sorrow, to 
minister to each other in all pain, to be one with each other 
in silent, unspeakable memories at the moment of the last 
parting? 


CHAPTER LV. 

MARRIAGE BELLS. 

I N little more than a month after that meeting on the hill, 
— on a rimy morning in departing November, — Adam 
and Dinah were married. 

It was an event much thought of in the village. All Mr. 
Burge’s men had a holiday, and all Mr. Poyser’s ; and most 
of those who had a holiday appeared in their best clothes at 
the wedding. I think there was hardly an inhabitant of Hay- 
slope specially mentioned in this history and still resident 

537 


ADAM BEDE 


in the parish on this November morning, who was not either 
in church to see Adam and Dinah married, or near the 
church door to greet them as they came forth. Mrs. Irwine 
and her daughters were waiting at the churchyard gates in 
their carriage (for they had a carriage now) to shake hands 
with the bride and bridegroom, and wish them well ; and in 
the absence of Miss Lydia Donnithorne at Bath, Mrs. Best, 
Mr. Mills, and Mr. Craig had felt k incumbent on them to 
represent “ the family ” at the Chase on the occasion. The 
churchyard walk was quite lined with familiar faces, many 
of them faces that had first looked at Dinah when she 
preached on the Green ; and no wonder they showed this 
eager interest on her marriage morning, for nothing like 
Dinah and the history which had brought her and Adam 
Bede together had been known at Hayslope within the mem- 
ory of man. 

Bessy Cranage, in her neatest cap and frock, was crying, 
though she did not exactly know why; for as her cousin 
Wiry Ben, who stood near her, judiciously suggested, Dinah 
was not going away, and if Bessy was in low spirits, the best 
thing for her to do was to follow Dinah’s example, and 
marry an honest fellow who was ready to have her. Next 
to Bessy, just within the church door there were the Poyser 
children, peeping round the corner of the pews to get a 
sight of the mysterious ceremony ; Totty’s face wearing 
an unusual air of anxiety at the idea of seeing Cousin Dinah 
come back looking rather old, for in Totty’s experience no 
married people were young. 

I envy them all the sight they had when the marriage was 
fairly ended and Adam led Dinah out of church. She was 
not in black this morning ; for her aunt Poyser would by no 
means allow such a risk of incurring bad luck, and had her- 
self made a present of the wedding dress, made all of gray, 
though in the usual Quaker form, — for on this point Dinah 
could not give way. So the lily face looked out with sweet 
gravity from under a gray Quaker bonnet, neither smiling 
nor blushing, but with lips trembling a little under the 
weight of solemn feelings. Adam, as he pressed her arm to 
his side, walked with his old erectness and his head thrown 
rather backward as if to face all the world better; but it 

538 


MARRIAGE BELLS 


was not because he was particularly proud this morning, as 
is the wont of bridegrooms, for his happiness was of a kind 
that had little reference to men’s opinion of it. There was 
a tinge of sadness in his deep joy ; Dinah knew it, and did 
not feel aggrieved. 

There were three other couples, following the bride and 
bridegroom : first, Martin Poyser, looking as cheery as a 
bright fire on this rimy morning, led quiet Mary Burge, the 
bridesmaid; then came Seth, serenely happy, with Mrs. 
Poyser on his arm ; and last of all, Bartle Massey, with Lis- 
beth, — Lisbeth in a new gown and bonnet, too busy with 
her pride in her son, and her delight in possessing the one 
daughter she had desired, to devise a single pretext for 
complaint. 

Bartle Massey had consented to attend the wedding at 
Adam’s earnest request, under protest against marriage in 
general, and the marriage of a sensible man in particular. 
Nevertheless, Mr. Poyser had a joke against him after the 
wedding dinner, to the effect that in the vestry he had given 
the bride one more kiss than was necessary. 

Behind this last couple came Mr. Irwine, glad at heart 
over this good morning’s work of joining Adam and Dinah. 
For he had seen Adam in the worst moments of his sorrow ; 
and what better harvest from that painful seed-time could 
there be than this? The love that had brought hope and 
comfort in the hour of despair, the love that had found its 
way to the dark prison cell and to poor Hetty’s darker soul, 
— this strong, gentle love was to be Adam’s companion and 
helper till death. 

There was much shaking of hands mingled with God 
bless you’s,” and other good wishes to the four couples, at 
the churchyard gate, Mr. Poyser answering for the rest with 
unwonted vivacity of tongue, for he had all the appropriate 
wedding-day jokes at his command. And thjs women, he 
observed, could never do anything but put finger in eye at 
a wedding. Even Mrs. Poyser could not trust herself to 
speak as the neighbours shook hands with her; and Lis- 
beth began to cry in the face of the very first person who 
told her she was getting young again. 

Mr. Joshua Rann, having a slight touch of rheumatism, 

539 


ADAM BEDE 


did not join in the ringing of the bells this morning, and, 
looking on with some contempt at these informal greetings 
which required no official co-operation from the clerk, be- 
gan to hum in his musical bass, “ Oh, what a joyful thing 
it is,” by way of preluding a little to the effect he intended 
to produce in the wedding psalm next Sunday. 

That ’s a bit of good news to cheer Arthur,” said Mr. 
Irwine to his mother, as they drove off. I shall write to 
him the first thing when we get home.” 


EPILOGUE. 

I T is near the end of June, in 1807. The workshops have 
been shut up half an hour or more in Adam Bede’s tim- 
ber-yard, which used to be Jonathan Burge’s, and the mel- 
low evening light is falling on the pleasant house with the 
buff walls and the soft gray thatch, very much as it did when 
we saw Adam bringing in the keys on that June evening 
nine years ago. 

There is a figure we know well, just come out of the 
house, and shading her eyes with her hands as she looks 
for something in the distance ; for the rays that fall on her 
white borderless cap and her pale auburn hair are very 
dazzling. But now she turns away from the sunlight and 
looks towards the door. 

We can see the sweet pale face quite well now: it is 
scarcely at all altered, — only a little fuller, to correspond 
to her more matronly figure, which still seems light and 
active enough in the plain black dress. 

“ I see him, Seth,” Dinah said, as she looked into the 
house. “ Let us go and meet him. Come, Lisbeth, come 
with mother.” 

The last call was answered immediately by a small fair 
creature with pale auburn hair and gray eyes, little more 
than four years old, who ran out silently and put her hand 
into her mother’s. 

Come, Uncle Seth,” said Dinah. 

Ay, ay, we ’re coming,” Seth answered from within, and 

540 


EPILOGUE 


presently appeared stooping under the doorway, being taller 
than usual by the black head of a sturdy two-year-old 
nephew, v/ho had caused some delay by demanding to be 
carried on uncle’s shoulder. 

Better take him on thy arm, Seth,” said Dinah, looking 
fondly at the stout, black-eyed fellow. ** He ’s troublesome 
to thee so.” 

''Nay, nay; Addy likes a ride on my shoulder. I can 
carry him so for a bit.” A kindness which young Addy 
acknowledged by drumming his heels with promising force 
against Uncle Seth’s chest. But to walk by Dinah’s side, 
and be tyrannized over by Dinah’s and Adam’s children, 
was Uncle Seth’s earthly happiness. 

" Where didst see him ? ” asked Seth, as they walked on 
into the adjoining field. " I can’t catch sight of him any- 
where.” 

" Between the hedges by the roadside,” said Dinah. " I 
saw bis hat and his shoulder. There be is again.” 

" Trust thee for catching sight of him if he ’s anywhere to 
be seen,” said Seth, smiling. " Thee ’t like poor mother 
used to be. She was always on the look-out for Adam, and 
could see him sooner than other folks, for all her eyes got 
dim.” 

" He ’s been longer than he expected,” said Dinah, taking 
Arthur’s watch from a small side-pocket and looking at it; 
*' it ’s nigh upon seven now.” 

" Ay, they ’d have a deal to say to one another,” said Seth, 
" and the meeting ’ud touch ’em both pretty closish. Why, 
it ’s getting on towards eight years since they parted.” 

" Yes,” said Dinah, " Adam was greatly moved this morn- 
ing at the thought of the change he should see in the poor 
young man, from the sickness he has undergone, as well as 
the years which have changed us all. And the death of the 
poor wanderer, when she was coming back to us, has been 
sorrow upon sorrow.” 

" See, Addy,” said Seth, lowering the young one to his 
arm now, and pointing, " there ’s father coming, — at the 
far stile.” 

Dinah hastened her steps, and little Lisbeth ran on at her 
utmost speed till she clasped her father’s leg. Adam patted 

541 


ADAM BEDE 


her head and lifted her up to kiss her ; but Dinah could see 
the marks of agitation on his face as she approached him 
and he put her arm within his in silence. 

“ Well, youngster, must I take you ? ” he said, trying to 
smile, when Addy stretched out his arms, — ready, with 
the usual baseness of infancy, to give up -his uncle Seth at 
once, now there was some rarer patronage at hand. 

“ It ’s cut me a good deal, Dinah/' Adam said at last, 
when they were walking on. 

'' Didst find him greatly altered ? " said Dinah. 

Why, he 's altered and yet not altered. I should ha' 
known him anywhere. But his colour 's changed, and he 
looks sadly. However, the doctors say he 'll soon be set 
right in his own country air. He 's all sound in th’ inside ; 
it 's only the fever shattered him so. But he speaks just the 
same, and smiles at me just as he did when he was a lad. 

It 's wonderful how he 's always had just the same sort o' 
look when he smiles." 

I 've never seen him smile, poor young man f " said 
Dinah. 

“ But thee wilt see him smile to-morrow," said Adam. 

‘‘ He asked after thee the first thing when he began to come 
round, and we could talk to one another. ‘ I hope she is n’t 
altered,’ he said ; ‘ I remember her face so well.' I told him 
‘ no,' ” Adam continued, looking fondly at the eyes that were 
turned up towards his, “ only a bit plumper as thee 'dst a 
right to be after seven year. ' I may come and see her to- 
morrow, may n’t I ? ' he said ; ‘ I long to tell her how I 've 
thought of her all these years.' " 

“ Didst tell him I 'd always used the watch ? " said Dinah. 

and we talked a deal about thee, for he says he 
nevetr-'Saw a woman a bit like thee. ^ I shall turn Methodist 
some day,’ he said, " when she preaches out of doors, and go 
to hear her.’ And I said, ^ Nay, sir, you can’t do that ; for 
Conference has forbid the women preaching, and she 's given < 
it up, all but talking to the people a bit in their houses.' ” 

“ Ah,” said Seth, who could not repress a comment on this 
point, and a sore pity it was o’ Conference ; and if Dinah j 
had seen as I did, we 'd ha' left the Wesleyans and joined a • 
body that 'ud put no bonds on Christian liberty.” 1 

542 (' 


EPILOGUE 


-“Nay, lad, nay,” said Adam, “she was right and thee 
ast wrong. There ’s no rule so wise but what it ’s a pity for 
►mebody or other. Most o’ the women do more harm nor 
^ood with their preaching, — they’ve not got Dinah’s gift 
lor her sperrit ; and she ’s seen that, and she thought it 
ight to set th’ example o’ submitting, for she ’s not held from 
)ther sorts o’ teaching. And I agree with her, and approve 
3’ what she did.” 

Seth was silent. This was a standing subject of difference 
rarely alluded to; and Dinah, wishing to quit it at once, 
jaid, — 

“ Didst remember, Adam, to speak to Colonel Donni- 
thome the words my uncle and aunt intrusted to thee ? ” 

“ Yes, and he ’s going to the Hall Farm with Mr. Irwine 
the day after to-morrow. Mr. Irwine came in while we were 
talking about it, and he would have it as the Colonel must 
see nobody but thee to-morrow; he said — and he’s in the 
right of it — as it ’ll be bad for him t’ have his feelings stirred 
with seeing many people one after another. ‘ We must get 
you strong and hearty,’ he said ; ‘ that ’s the first thing to be 
done, Arthur, and then you shall have your own way. But 
I shall keep you under your old tutor’s thumb till then.’ 
Mr. Irwine ’s fine and joyful at having him home again.” 
Adam was silent a little while, and then said, — 

“ It was very cutting when we first saw one another. He ’d 
never heard about poor Hetty till Mr. Irwine met him in 
London, for the letters missed him on his journey. The 
first thing he said to me, when we ’d got hold o’ one an- 
other’s hands, was, ' I could never do anything for her, 
Adam, — she lived long enough for all the suffering, — and 
I ’d thought so of the time when I might do somethin' ^or 
her. But you told me the truth when you said to me o.ice, 
“ There ’s a sort of wrong that can never be made up for.” 

“Why, there’s Mr. and Mrs., Poyser coming in at the 
yard-gate,” said Seth. 

“ So there is,” said Dinah. “ Run, Lisbeth, run to meet 
Aunt Poyser. Come in, Adam, and rest ; it has been a hard 
day for thee.” 

THE END. 


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